


Maker-Breaker

by amcw177



Series: The hacker and his spy [1]
Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: Hackers, M/M, Minor Character Death, Person of Interest AU, Spies & Secret Agents, shit I learned from TV
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-18
Updated: 2013-04-18
Packaged: 2017-12-08 21:19:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 16
Words: 37,385
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/766131
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amcw177/pseuds/amcw177
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Aomine Daiki used to spy for the CIA - until his employment was rather violently terminated. Luckily, he is picked up by Kuroko Tetsuya, a computer genius who just so happens to need the skill set of a former secret agent. Helped by a mysterious machine that predicts crimes, they embark on a mission to bring down the bad guys, save lives, and drive an unfortunate detective crazy. And just when things are going well, Aomine's past catches up with them. Only this time, he has more to fight for than ever before.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is an AU inspired by a brilliant TV show called '[Person of Interest](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1839578/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1)'. If you're not watching it yet, I highly recommend it. Even so, knowledge of the show is not required in order to read this.
> 
> Random tidbit: The title is derived from [combinatorial game theory](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maker-Breaker_game). It's a type of positional game in which there can be no draw. Think Tic-Tac-Toe, for example.
> 
> And last but not least, a huge thank you to [andreaphobia](http://archiveofourown.org/users/andreaphobia) who was a much appreciated source of encouragement and even took it upon herself to beta this. Any remaining mistakes are mine. Should you spot any, let me know and I'll correct them.
> 
> Ps.: If you happen to stumble upon this right now, please bear with me as I am trying to post this in one go. It may take a bit.

It is 10:28 PM in the Leninskiy district, Irkutsk, it is 30 below zero, and Aomine has just rage-quit his job. (Although yelling _‘I quit!’_ at the top of your lungs at a burning building that your employer has blown up around you is perhaps only a formality.)

Sadly, it doesn’t change the fact that he is now a) stranded in a foreign city without help and b) bleeding from what appear to be several wounds caused by flying debris.

And his Russian is shit to boot.

He wasn’t even supposed to talk all that much. It was a simple in-and-out job. Get access to the warehouse, retrieve the package, head back to the airport. No muss, no fuss.

He should have known it was a trap. In reality, there was no need to send an agent of his caliber. Any rookie could have broken in there and stolen a fucking hard drive. But they sent him, so either this job wasn’t as easy as it looked, or...

Well, the problem with retirement from this sort of profession is that you hardly ever see it coming. Especially when it’s your own side doing the retiring.

Be that as it may, it leaves Aomine with limited options. There is almost certainly a satellite searching for his heat signature - which is going to be _zero_ if he doesn’t find medical supplies soon - and the Agency won’t be dumb enough to not scour the area for his remains. So he really needs to get his ass moving.

He struggles up from the heap of snow where he has landed, wincing and quickly inspecting the damage. For someone who just got violently ejected from a building, he doesn’t look too bad. He took cover early, so that might have helped. However, he didn’t escape unscathed: there are some cuts and slices in his jacket, the down filling’s spilling out, tainted red in places, and his right leg isn’t responding as it should, but all in all, he should be able to make it to the nearest clinic if he doesn’t linger.

The worst enemy of blood loss is cold, and Aomine is pretty sure in a few minutes he is going to have difficulties picking a lock.

He sticks his hands under his arms to keep them warm and starts making his way towards the city lights.

\---

Aomine Daiki hasn’t always been a government-approved killer. There was this time when he was sixteen and he wanted to be a professional basketball player, for example.

Somewhere down the road, something had obviously gone phenomenally wrong.

\---

The veterinary clinic he breaks into is the shoddiest thing he has ever seen. He wouldn’t even bring a dying dog in here if it was the last place on Earth.

But it will have to do for now. A quick patch-up job to stop the bleeding and provide some support for his leg is all he needs, anyway.

He tries calling Momoi from a payphone two blocks away, afterwards. Secret agents don’t have friends, but if he had one, it would be her. She has been his handler ever since he joined the Agency, and even Aomine has to admire her tenacity. He has always been a problem child - all the Agency did was give him a gun and point him in the right direction. Momoi’s tolerance for his bullshit is beyond staggering.

But when he calls her number now, it is disconnected. He tries not to worry. She is a trained operative just like him. She either went off the grid when she heard about his mishap with a building or she was reassigned. Granted, that would be quick, but the Agency is nothing if not swift to count its blessings.

Either way, he has other means to reach her.

He pays a little boy off the street to send a note with a time and place to a P.O. box. It’s a delicate system of Chinese whispers, basically, but it’s worked before. Incidentally, there goes the last of the cash he snagged from the clinic’s _‘Save the Oompa Loompas or Some Shit’_ piggy bank, but at least he knows it’s money well invested.

He does make it out of Russia in the end. The ID he is forced to use barely fools the customs officers, but he exits Warsaw Chopin Airport before anyone can start asking questions.

Warsaw wouldn’t have been his first choice to lay low and get a new cover ID put together, but beggars can’t be choosers.

He can’t go back to Japan. It used to be his home base and there are too many people who might recognise his face. He briefly considers catching a freighter to Hawai’i. He still has family there from his mother’s side, but he drops the thought. It’s the first place the Agency will look for him.

It’s an option for much later, though; when enough time has passed and the Agency has downscaled the importance of such a man hunt. Either way, he needs to make it into the US first.

So he takes baby steps; going from Poland to Germany, to Portugal, to the UK, and doubles back once or twice before finally heading to the US.

He lives on stolen IDs and cash that barely gets him from one country to the next, grabbing suitcases off the baggage claim and hoping that the clothes inside will fit him. Not just once does he end up with a woman’s luggage. Hey, it’s not like every woman’s suitcase is pink, so it’s a fifty-fifty chance.

Since he can’t rely on any former Agency contacts, he has to forge his passports himself. Within Europe it’s relatively easy to slip by undetected, but his identity needs to be airtight if he wants to get into the US unnoticed.

Fortunately, not all of Aomine’s contacts are on the government’s payroll, so when he tracks down Sakurai he is delighted to find that the man is still in business - and as apologetic as ever, which makes blackmailing a new ID out of him a piece of cake.

With a bit of luck and Sakurai’s stunning ability to create documents that would even fool Aomine’s own mother, he’ll make it through security. Hopefully, the Agency hasn’t figured out yet that the roasted corpse deposited not too far from the warehouse isn’t Aomine but a generous donation from the local morgue.

Otherwise, he might as well hand himself over, and this time they will make extra sure that he _stays dead_.


	2. Chapter 2

Aomine is highly trained, educated, clever, and can kill a person with a toothpick in 2.5 seconds.

And yet, all of this means jack squat when you are a dead spy.

He can’t exactly fill out a job application, stating his professional experience as _‘killing, maiming, and occasionally kidnapping’_. Besides, officially? He doesn’t even _exist_.

The Agency made sure to wipe all traces of him from the system, and once you’re out, _you’re out_. He’s going to have a hard time getting back in with identities that he burns through on a frighteningly regular basis.

Plus, stealing identities of actual, living persons is always risky. The system reacts allergic to two people leading a life under the same social security number. And in addition, the more financially alert the original bearer of said identity is, the sooner they will notice withdrawals from their bank accounts that they never made.

As a result, Aomine blows through no less than a dozen IDs in the first six months that he’s back in the States.

But that’s not the problem. The _real_ trouble starts, as it so often does, with something that could have been avoided.

But sometimes, people are just dumb.

\---

Aomine, alias Jacob Hollander, is sitting squeezed between a pregnant woman and an elderly bloke who smells of tobacco and moth balls.

The subway rattles from station to station, taking late night travelers off the island of Manhattan. The train is empty enough that Aomine can see into the adjoining carriages on both ends, which is reassuring for someone who is wont to look both ways even before going to sleep. Sometimes _especially_ before going to sleep.

He keeps his head purposely low, feigning fatigue from a long work day in the city. Jacob Hollander is a trader working on Wall Street, and hence late hours aren’t unusual. What Jacob Hollander doesn’t know is that, besides being a workaholic, he is also currently watching three highly suspicious individuals making their way to his carriage.

Jacob Hollander is surprisingly alert for someone who is snoring.

The trio is barely older than 18 in average, but age has never stopped Aomine from being a danger to society, so he recognises the signs when he sees them.

The smallest of the three is hiding his hand under his jacket, which makes Aomine sigh in annoyance. This is the stupidest possible way to conceal a weapon.

The train rolls out of the station and Aomine counts down from five in his head.

He smiles grimly into the upturned collar of his coat when the tiny one pulls a six-shooter and starts yelling at people to hand over their valuables. People crouch and shriek in fear, grabbling for their possessions and dumping them in the bag that’s being shoved under their noses.

The thieves find themselves bang out of luck with Aomine, though.

When it’s his turn to give up his money, Aomine simply shrugs. “Sorry, I got nothing.”

“Bullshit!” The gang leader exclaims, waving the gun in Aomine’s face. “I can tell by your suit alone that you’re the jackpot tonight!”

Oh, he’s a jackpot alright.

He opens his coat with a pitying smile. “Search me if you don’t believe me.”

Fuck-up #2 promptly does so while mini Al Capone keeps the gun trained on Aomine’s face. Or his ear - Aomine can’t be sure with how much the guy is trembling.

Dealing with nervous gunmen is a pain in the ass because you never know what will tip them over the edge. If you know _why_ they are nervous, it can give you an advantage, but without more clues Aomine can only guess it’s because the next stop is not too far ahead.

#2 comes up empty, of course.

“I told you,” Aomine smirks. He is being tremendously generous, considering he could grab the gun and incapacitate all of them in under one minute. But he is giving them a chance. He hasn’t done that in a while.

“Fuck you!” The barrel ends up pressed against Aomine’s forehead, where it is most likely going to leave an imprint. It is also an extremely bad move, because it brings the gun into easy reach.

“I know you’ve got some! Where is your money? I swear, I’ll shoot you in the face, fuckhead!”

“Wow, you kiss your mother with that mouth?” Aomine grins, edging a little forward on his seat, planting his feet firmly on the floor. Next to him, the pregnant lady gives a shocked yelp and tries to scramble away as far as possible. Good. He’s going to need her out of the way anyway.

“Shut the fuck up and hand over your watch!” Al Caponicchi is having a hard time controlling his trigger finger. “I’ll take it off your dead body if you don-”

He breaks off in mid-sentence on account of getting hit in the face with his own gun. It slides over the floor and disappears under the seats.

#2 is in Aomine’s face in an instant, poking at him with a switchblade. Aomine almost laughs out loud. A tackle, a quick dodge, an elbow to the gut, and an anatomically unpleasant encounter with the grab pole and #2 is on the ground, screaming in agony and clutching his broken arm.

The blade, however, is now in Aomine’s hand. Unfortunately, gang member #3 has gotten a hold of the gun and is shooting at him.

Aomine ducks, kicks the awakening ringleader in the face for good measure, and pummels #3 to the ground. The gun flies from his hand but Aomine stops it with his foot, keeping it from slithering towards #2.

He forces #3 around and half-removes the guy’s hoodie, twisting and knotting it together behind the wannabe-gangster’s back. It’s not the same as a straitjacket but it will do the trick until Aomine can find a more permanent solution.

Considering the commotion they’ve caused, there is simply no way that the police haven’t been alerted by now. And if not, well, Aomine will make sure that they find these punks packed up nice and tight at the next station.

Meanwhile, #2 is, against all odds, getting back up and shakily attacking Aomine with a briefcase. Aomine stabs it and twirls it out of the man’s grasp in one fluid motion.

Sadly, this also means letting go of the gun, which #2 picks up immediately after the loss of his leathery shield. The guy is grinning, albeit with a great deal of pain mixed in.

Aomine heaves another sigh.

\---

“I have you on video, taking out three armed perps _on your own_ and you wanna tell me _it was just a reflex_?”

Detective Kagami is not only annoying but also highly suspicious of Aomine. He has every right to be, but Aomine is nothing if not equally annoying.

He smiles, casually removing his tie. He doubts he’ll need to be dressed to the nines to escape a police station. “Like I told you, I’ve had some intensive self-defence training.”

The detective’s eyebrows - all four of them, if Aomine counted correctly - shoot up into his hairline. He points an accusatory finger at the grumbling and whining subway gangsters as they are being shoved through a door towards the holding cells. “Self-defence? Are you kidding me? One’s got a broken nose, the other has a dislocated shoulder, and one’s got a broken arm. _And_ you shot him in the leg.”

“I may have gone a little overboard in my panic.”

“Panic,” detective Kagami deadpans, slumping back in his chair. “That doesn’t look like panic to me. Looks more like military training.”

Aomine gives a half-assed shrug. “My dad served. He showed me a few tricks.”

Baseless lies are dangerous. They are easy to spot if you know what to look for, and they are impossible to prove should anyone take an interest. But right now, Aomine can’t afford the police sending his description to everyone and their dog.

“Seems like your dad is a capable man.”

Aomine keeps his face carefully blank. “That he was. Are we done here, detective? I have an appointment.”

Detective Kagami grimaces. “Then I suggest you reschedule, because I have a few more questions. Excuse me a second, I have to go check something.”

He gets up and holds out Aomine’s driver’s license, squinting at it. “You don’t mind me holding on to this for a moment, do you, Mister... Hollander?”

“Not at all, detective.” Aomine offers him a gracious smile and watches him storm off, possibly to get Aomine’s identity verified.

Consider that another alias burned, then.

He is just about to inconspicuously meander his way out of the constant chaos of this Manhattan police station when a young man stops him.

“Ah, Mister Hollander,” he says, and Aomine swallows. Nobody should be able to identify him as such without knowing that he is _not_. There is no scenario in which this could possibly end well.

“Yes?” Aomine nevertheless replies. When in doubt, hold on to your act for as long as you can.

The little guy is about a head smaller than Aomine and is wearing a suit that most detectives only get to admire through a shop window. He looks like a lawyer.

And he is.

“Thank you, officer.” The suit leans over a cop’s desk and puts an embossed card on top of a stack of case files. “I found my client. Here is my card, the name is Izuki Shun. I’ll be taking over from here. Please let detective Kagami know that if he has any more questions for Mister Hollander he can call me under this number and we will try our best to be of assistance.”

The officer turns the business card over in his hands and gives a noncommittal grunt before shooing them out.

Izuki - provided that that _is_ his real name - confidently steers Aomine across the street and towards a black limousine.

Black limousines are never a good sign.

“Okay.” Aomine shakes free of Izuki’s light grasp. “I never called a lawyer, so who the hell are you?”

“My employer would like to have a word with you.” Izuki smiles the ineffable smile of a skilled courtroom strategist. Fine, he might _actually_ be a lawyer.

He gestures at the limousine. “I recommend you get in before the good detective realises you’re gone. I suspect he might have a few very _probing_ questions, if you catch my drift.”

Aomine doesn’t give a shit about bad puns, fake IDs or raging cops at the moment. He has bigger problems and no time to kid around.

He steps into Izuki’s personal space, growling, “I’m going to ask you one more time. Who. The fuck. Are you.”

“I was hired to retrieve you from this police station,” Izuki answers calmly. “That is all I know. For any further details I suggest you talk to my employer.”

Aomine narrows his eyes and doesn’t move an inch. “CIA? Russian intelligence?”

Izuki offers him a polite yet slightly exasperated smile, and shakes his head no. “I am just a lawyer. One you will be in dire need of if detective Kagami sees us standing here.”

He nods towards the police station, where four-brows has sprinted out onto the sidewalk, frantically searching. He looks like he is ready to ram Aomine’s head through the wall of an interrogation room.

Not that Aomine couldn’t handle simpleton cops like that, but the more ruckus he kicks up, the sooner the Agency will pick up his trail. If they haven’t already, that is.

Aomine takes a step back and sizes Izuki up. “You’re not mafia, are you?”

“Not to my knowledge,” he replies, while opening the passenger door, “but then again, it’s so hard to tell these days.”

“You really are a lawyer,” Aomine concludes with a displeased grunt, but flops down in the back seat anyway.

“Funny, what changed your mind?” Izuki slides into the seat next to him and taps the tinted glass panel that separates the driver from the passengers. Aomine doesn’t like being driven around in vehicles by people he can’t see.

The limousine slowly reverses out of the parking spot and passes by an impressively pissed-off detective Kagami.

Aomine’s smile is thin and sharp when he answers, “Because you didn’t answer my question at all.”


	3. Chapter 3

The good thing about Agency training is that you get to expect anything, anywhere, at all times. Like being dropped off on an empty field by the river bank, for example.

Aomine cautiously walks towards the railing. It’s cold for a September day and the breeze is stern down here, so he turns up the collar of his coat and takes a careful look around.

He shrugs at Izuki, who is waiting by the car.

“If this is a joke, I’m not laughing,” he yells.

“It’s not a joke.”

“Holy ffff-!” Aomine jumps and almost tumbles over the railing. It’s pretty pathetic for a spy to be so easily surprised, but he could have sworn the little guy just _magically_ appeared behind him.

“Where the fuck did you come from?” Aomine scans the perimeter, but all possible hiding places are too far away.

The little one looks up at him with big blue eyes, and Aomine feels terribly dumb for not noticing someone with fucking _bright blue hair_. Or maybe it’s silver or white or transparent - hell, it’s as if this guy’s entire appearance is just an approximation of what he _might_ look like. Looking at him for too long gives Aomine a headache.

“I was here the entire time,” the young man says, as if he can’t believe Aomine would ever entertain a different theory.

Aomine snorts, “Fuck. No, you weren’t. I would have seen you.”

The little guy shrugs. “Yes, I get that a lot.”

He’s wearing a thick jacket and a scarf that wraps approximately nine hundred times around his neck, and it’s impossible to estimate his age. He could be 18 or 38. Aomine’s been trained to gauge his opponents in a matter of seconds, but this guy is giving him the chills. He’s giving Aomine absolutely _nothing_ to read, which is damned creepy unless you’re a corpse.

Aomine squares his shoulders and shoves his hands into his pockets now that he is relatively certain there won’t be any immediate attempts on his life. Little Guy has had his chance to kill Aomine, so he must want something else.

“So, you’re _’the employer’_ , huh?” Aomine leans against the railing facing up the river bank. If anything’s coming, it’s probably from there.

“Yes.”

Aomine gives the little guy a sideways glance. Well. At least, Aomine doesn’t have to tell him to shut up all the time.

“Okay, you’re going to have to be a little bit more specific if you want something from me.”

“You can call me Kuroko Tetsuya,” Fuzzy Smurf says, and extends his hand in greeting. It’s astonishingly soft and comfortably warm when Aomine shakes it. No bruises or rough patches from handling any sort of weapon. Good to know.

“Oh, can I?” Aomine grins in mockery. He doubts that this is the guy’s real name, but whatever. One name’s as good as any.

“So,” Aomine flops down on the nearby bench, “wanna tell me what this is all about, _Tetsu_?”

A faint flicker of irritation crosses Kuroko’s face. It pays to know what makes people mad. You can either avoid it or use it to your advantage.

Although Aomine has to admit, for a layman, Kuroko has exceptional control over his facial expressions. Suddenly, Aomine wants to see what will _really_ make him angry.

So he decides to call him Tetsu for the rest of their conversation.

The newly-nicknamed sits down next to him, the scarf riding up to cover half of his face. He wrestles it back down and tucks it under the collar of his jacket. He looks like an 8-year-old that got lost and is waiting for his mom to pick him up at the information desk. Funny, because his eyes don’t look the part.

“You could say I’m a concerned citizen,” Tetsu says, eventually. “And I would like to offer you a job.”

Aomine lets his head fall back and stares at the bleak sky. “Fuck. I knew it.” He sits back up and sighs, “ Listen, if you’re looking to hire a killer, there’s plenty of goons out there who will be happy to take your money. But I’m done with this shit. So thanks, but no, thanks.”

He shakes his head and stands up.

“Exactly.”

“What?” Aomine turns back around, frowning.

“I am not looking for a killer.” Tetsu shuffles around on the bench until he’s facing Aomine. “I’m looking for someone to save people from getting killed.”

Aomine smirks,.“The word you’re looking for is ‘po-lice’.”

“They can’t help me.”

“What trouble are you even in, for fuck’s sake?”

“It’s not me who’s in trouble. It’s other people.”

Aomine rubs his chin and contemplates this for a moment. Then he smiles like he would at a kid that insists Santa is real, and leans down to Tetsu. “Tell you what, people are _always_ in trouble. Ain’t nothing you can do about it. Believe me, I’ve tried.”

Tetsu’s gaze is eerily steady when he looks Aomine in the eyes. “I can.”

Fine, Aomine decides to indulge the little one, “Okay. How?” Then he smirks, whispering, “Are you Batman?”

Tetsu tilts his head to the side, and for a brief moment Aomine is worried he might actually _be_ Batman. But then Tetsu smiles like he’s figured out a good punchline to this joke. “Something like that. Only without the cape.”

“I swear, if you’re asking me to follow you to the Batcave I will personally call an ambulance on you, because you clearly need medical assistance.”

Tetsu chuckles, low and into his scarf. “Don’t worry. My last checkup didn’t show any signs of psychological disorders. Then again - what is the definition of sanity...”

Aomine blinks and finally stands up straight, eyeing Tetsu. “Who the hell are you.”

He’s not posing it as a question anymore, because it’s quite obvious that he won’t get a conclusive answer any time soon. But he is beginning to wonder; beginning to be genuinely _interested_.

Tetsu gets up, fiddling the scarf back into submission, and gestures at the waiting limousine. “I’ll show you, if you are willing to take a chance.”

Aomine glances back at the car, eyes narrowed in suspicion. This is too obvious a play for any of the intelligence agencies - they prefer the more subtle ways of getting rid of you. They don’t ship you out to the river banks in a Mercedes and then invite you for coffee. The trip usually ends at the river bank, if anything.

He turns back around and grins in what he considers a bold manner. “‘Chance’ is my middle name.”

Tetsu frowns. “No, actually it’s-”

“No, stop it with the creeper vibes,” Aomine sighs. “Not even the Agency knows my middle name. So let’s just stick to Daiki, okay?”

“Okay.” Tetsu shrugs, but Aomine detects a smile on his face that is far too fond for someone he has only met ten minutes ago. Strangely enough, he doesn’t even mind.

\---

“This,” Aomine ascertains, “is a gym.”

Tetsu leads the way further into the hall, some of the lights flickering on above in tandem with his movements - motion sensors, apparently. Not exactly standard equipment for a decommissioned gym, but alright, _noted_.

“It used to be, yes.” Tetsu points at the basketball hoop which appears to be the only functioning leftover of the building’s initial purpose. “I used to play ball here.”

Aomine perks up. “When was that?”

“A long time ago,” Tetsu says, with the air of someone who knows exactly what you’re trying to do and finds it adorable yet useless.

“Were you any good?” Aomine asks, conversationally, as he strolls towards the conglomeration of desks in the corner. No less than five monitors the size of Aomine’s bed at the last motel are arranged neatly in a half-circle, and the low buzz of several processors fills the immediate vicinity. Cables wind in and out of the huddle of tables and off into the dark.

Tetsu hangs his jacket and scarf on a nearby set of loops dangling from the high ceiling. He flops down on the chair behind the monitors and answers without looking up, “Not by your standards, I suppose.”

He points at a file binder prominently lying on the edge of the desk. Aomine picks it up and sputters when he sees what’s inside.

“Where the hell did you get those?” Aomine fishes out a picture of his old basketball team, back in high school. He tries not to notice how bored his expression is in all of those.

“Your old teammate,” Tetsu replies, as if he expects Aomine to remember. “Wakamatsu, I believe is his name.”

Aomine gapes, brain racing to put a face to the name. He remembers a loud, over-enthusiastic guy who he didn’t get along with too well. (Although that holds true for a lot of people in his life.)

“He kept those pictures?” Aomine marvels, as he squints to make out faces in the photograph.

“Not everyone means to forget.”

 _Ouch._ Aomine never considered himself a man on the run, but due to recent events, he’s realised that he may have been for the greater part of his life. It would help tremendously, though, if he knew where he was heading.

At least, he’s got something legitimate to run _from_ now, so that covers the otherwise crushing awkwardness of this realisation.

He angrily shoves the pictures back inside the folder and dumps it on Tetsu’s keyboard. “Don’t fucking try this psychological bullshit on me. I know how that works.”

Tetsu carefully sorts the pictures back into order and places the folder aside, observing Aomine like a matador judging how far he can go until the bull charges.

“Naturally,” he says, then - possibly the most diplomatic answer Aomine has ever heard.

“So, what is it you wanted to show me?” Aomine snarls, for lack of anything witty to counter with.

Tetsu indicates a second chair haphazardly stacked on top of a broken springboard and invites him to sit. “This.”

Aomine wiggles into place next to Tetsu and tries to determine which screen he’s supposed to be looking at. The chair creaks ominously when he leans forward.

There are various documents and social network sites displayed, all of which seem to refer to the same person - a man named Kiyoshi Teppei.

Aomine angles a sideways glance at Tetsu. “So? Who is this guy?”

“He owns a pet store, together with his fiancé,” Tetsu explains, clicking through the websites. “He spent the first few years of his life in Japan but moved here with his parents when he was eight. He holds a bachelor’s degree in veterinary medicine but broke off his studies to open up this store. He has one open parking ticket, that he claims on Twitter was his fiancé’s fault, he volunteers at the dog shelter twice a week, and he coaches a little league basketball team on Saturdays. No priors, no complaints from neighbours or customers.”

Aomine’s shoulders sag. “Is this a contest for most boring human being on the planet, or what are you trying to tell me with this?”

Tetsu gives him a strange look then, and opens up another document. “What I’m trying to tell you is, if he is such a boring person, how come he ended up in intensive care two weeks ago due to getting beaten half to death two blocks away from his home?”

Aomine gives a helpless shrug. He’s no stranger to violence and people need to not be so fucking surprised that it exists.

“How the fuck should I know? Robbery gone bad? Wrong place at the wrong time? Maybe he’s a prick?”

“Not according to my research.” Tetsu shakes his head no, eyes sad and fixed upon the hospital report. “Both his legs were broken, and the doctors are not certain if he’ll ever be able to walk again without crutches. He likes to play basketball in the backyard of their house, did I mention that?”

So Tetsu’s pulling the pity card. Aomine rolls his eyes. He can’t even remember the last time this worked on him. Spend any prolonged time in the spy business and pity becomes the social equivalent of putting your head into the oven. He knows it’s fucked up, but if he got a dollar for every time an opposing agent tried to go for the pity act, Aomine wouldn’t be sitting here in a pair of pants he hasn’t changed in three days.

He stopped pitying himself a long time ago, and that has a tendency to extend to other people as well.

“Nice try, Tetsu.” Aomine leans back and smirks. “But these kinds of things happen. And if we relied on it happening to the ones that deserve it, we’d all be in trouble, believe me. Ain’t nothing we can do about it.”

“I’m sorry, but I disagree.” The sadness is suddenly gone from Tetsu’s eyes, replaced by eerily calm determination. “We _can_ do something about it.”

He rummages through another file binder and extracts a piece of paper, holding it out to Aomine. It has nothing but a series of numbers on it, scribbled down hastily in what Aomine presumes is Tetsu’s handwriting.

Tetsu points at the note. “This is Kiyoshi Teppei’s social security number. I received it three days prior to the incident. I tried to prev-”

“Hold on.” Aomine frowns, properly alarmed now. “What do you mean you _’received it’_? Who gave it to you?”

Tetsu hesitates, but doesn’t avert his gaze when he answers, “The machine.”

“The what?”

“The machine.” Tetsu sounds as if he is giving away government secrets. Aomine is beginning to think he might be. Either that, or he’s delusional.

“Look.” Tetsu takes a deep breath. “What would you say if I told you that there is a machine somewhere, a computer the size of several of these gym halls, that watches everyone? Every minute of every day.”

“I would say you’re crazy.”

This evokes a small smile. “I guess you’d have to be, in order to program such a thing.”

Aomine snorts. “Okay, assuming you’re right, why isn’t the CIA using it? Why do I still have to spend countless nights freezing my ass off in a run-down Dacia, watching some Arab dude through a pair of spy-glasses?”

“I imagine the CIA _is_ using it,” Tetsu contemplates. “At least to some extent. See, it was designed to establish connections between people, to analyse interactions, communication, even the briefest of contact, to detect potential terrorist threats.”

“What?” Aomine can’t believe what he’s hearing.

“It watches everyone, continuously, through security cameras, cell phones, laptops, weather cams, anything that provides visual or audio information.” Tetsu hits a few shortcuts on his keyboard and a multitude of video streams pops up on the screens. Aomine can tell they are live images; streams of traffic cams, ATM cameras, one is a feed from inside a police station in which detective Kagami is quite prominently featured sitting at his desk doing paperwork.

“So you can hack into security systems,” Aomine says, dismissively. “Big deal. The CIA’s been doing that for decades.”

“True,” Tetsu admits. “These are just the ones _I_ can hack into. The machine sees _everything_. As long as there is some form of connection, electronic or even just visual, it is able to use the data. It hears what you are saying, almost everywhere, it sees your every move and it is able to determine whether you are a threat or not. If you are, your number goes to the appropriate government agency and I imagine shortly afterwards you would have an unpleasant encounter with someone like yourself.”

Aomine’s brow furrows in thought. “And what if I’m not? A threat, I mean.”

“I doubt anyone would ever think that of you, Aomine-kun.”

Admittedly, Aomine does a double-take at this sudden streak of humour, but then he looks at Tetsu and discovers that he was being absolutely serious.

“Fine,” Aomine agrees, with a lopsided grin. “What if _a person_ is not a threat? What happens then?”

“Nothing. The machine writes it into a list and then purges that every night at midnight.”

Aomine arches one eyebrow in confusion. “Ooo-kay. So where’s the problem?”

“The problem is, none of these people are going to be okay. The fact that the machine doesn’t deem them a threat to national security doesn’t mean they are fine. Most of them become victims of violent crimes, like Kiyoshi-kun here. Others become perpetrators, committing such crimes. There is no telling which it is going to be but in one way or another these people will get hurt or will hurt someone else. It’s just not a matter of national security, so the government doesn’t care.”

“Well,” Aomine sits back, keeping his gaze trained on Tetsu, “this all seems highly illegal. Why would you go through all this trouble?”

Motivation is a powerful thing. If you know what motivates a person, you can steer them in any direction you want - basic CIA training 1-0-1. But Aomine has yet to learn why Tetsu is so fucking interested in interfering with other people’s lives.

Tetsu stares back at him, his expression impossible to read. “Why did you go on all these missions for the CIA?”

This is fast heading into uncomfortable territory. Also, counter questions are unfair.

Aomine shifts in his chair, trying to shake the uneasiness of talking about times long past. “Back then it seemed the right thing to do. It seemed the _only_ thing to do for me.”

Tetsu smiles. “See? It’s the same for me. I’ve found a way to help people who can’t or won’t get help anywhere else. And I’m tired of watching all these horrendous things happen even though I have the knowledge to stop them.”

“Then why don’t you go and... I don’t know,” Aomine waves his hand vaguely, “do something about it?”

Tetsu looks at him as if Aomine had asked him to wrestle a bear. “Kiyoshi-kun was attacked by five street thugs. Do I look like someone who is able to take on five gang members?”

This prompts Aomine to take in Tetsu’s physique for the first time since they met. Back at the river he could barely estimate Tetsu’s strength due to the thick jacket, but now he’s finally getting a good look at what he’s dealing with.

It’s not a whole lot to work with, Aomine has got to admit that.

With a bit of training, Tetsu could hold his own in a one-on-one fight, maybe. But as he is right now, with his lean frame and his delicate features, Aomine is pretty sure the safest place for him is indeed behind a wall of computers.

“And you think I can?” Aomine laughs.

“Yes,” Tetsu nods.

“Okay, yes.” The laughter dies in his throat. “I could. But I’m not with the CIA anymore. I can’t go around killing people, claiming it’s for the greater good.”

Tetsu suddenly gives him a scandalised look. “Nobody said anything about killing.”

“Fine!” Aomine throws his hands up in defeat. “Then what would you like me to do? _Ask them_ not to beat the shit out of people?”

“Have you ever even considered it? Asking, I mean.”

Aomine chuckles. “Trust me, you would _not_ like the way the CIA asks questions.”

Tetsu levels an unflinching look at him and nods firmly. “Then we’ll ask them our way.”

Aomine is beginning to suspect that this is a done deal. Nothing he can say will change Tetsu’s mind. He seems hellbent on having Aomine join his quest - because that’s what it is: a quest. And a damned crazy one at that.

The thing is, drifting from place to place and from alias to alias, living other people’s lives, tends to get old after a while. Maybe it’s time to start something new.

Also, it beats being essentially jobless.

Aomine leans forward, making sure that he has Tetsu’s full attention. He wants to make certain that they’re on the same page on this. He would like to avoid a repeat of his CIA days, which kind of ended with them being several chapters ahead.

“Okay.” He pokes a warning finger at Tetsu. “If I’m gonna be looking into this for you, you are going to have to tell me more about this _machine_ thing of yours. I hate not having all the variables. Shit like this has gotten a lot of good men killed.”

“You’re still alive,” Tetsu replies, with a tiny smile that has Aomine bristling. He’s not a goddamned child that finally managed to do his homework without parental help.

He snorts and gets up, putting up the collar of his coat that he never even bothered to take off. “I never said I was a good man.”

“Maybe you underestimate that part of you.”

“And I thought you did research on me.” Aomine turns around and smirks. It’s just a thin sheen of defiance, and it crumbles when Tetsu just keeps looking at him with this proud little smile on his face.

He gestures at the screens in front of Tetsu, in a desperate attempt to change the topic. “So, where is this Kiyoshi type at the moment?”

Tetsu’s fingers fly over the keyboard. “The GPS in his cell phone puts him at home. They live in an apartment above their shop.”

“Okay, give me the address. I’ll head over there and take a look around.”

“What, now?” Tetsu gives him a wide-eyed look.

Aomine presents him with a horrifyingly humourless grin. “Crime doesn’t sleep, Tetsu. With your machine and all that jazz, I thought you would know.”

“Aren’t you tired?”

“I’ve been through worse nights than this, believe me,” Aomine says, with a noncommittal shrug.

Tetsu looks as if he wants to ask what Aomine considers _’a worse night’_ , but obviously thinks better of it. Good, because Aomine is pretty sure he could give Tetsu nightmares with most of his stories.

“Wait.” Tetsu digs through a drawer and produces a brand new smartphone, along with a wireless earpiece. “You’ll need this. Don’t worry, it’s untraceable. I’ve made sure of that.”

Aomine eyes the earpiece. “And here I thought I’d quit the CIA.”

Tetsu does not appreciate the joke, judging by his expression. Aomine’s actually getting better at reading those.

He puts the earpiece in and taps it twice, wincing at the feedback.

“The address is saved on your phone. The PIN is 3108.”

Aomine frowns. “Wait, that’s my birthday.”

“I had to pick _something_. You can change it, of course.”

Aomine slides the phone into his coat pocket. “No, it’s fine. It’s not like it’s easy to find out anyway. For anyone that isn’t you, I guess.” He shoots a sideways glance at Tetsu, who seems to be oblivious to the compliment.

Tetsu goes back to fervently abusing the keyboard, which leaves Aomine standing awkwardly in the middle of the gym.

“Uhm.” He shuffles his feet. “You wouldn’t happen to have a car, would you? Doing surveillance out in the open is a pain in the ass.”

Tetsu’s head comes up behind the wall of computer screens, smiling. “I do.”


	4. Chapter 4

“What’s wrong?” Tetsu inquires, as they are standing before what Aomine can only describe as ‘the demise of the automotive industry’.

“It’s a 1966 Datsun, Tetsu.” Aomine tries not to stand too close to it for fear it might crumble if he exhales too sharply.

Tetsu looks back and forth between him and the car. “It’s not the most posh of neighbourhoods. I thought this might be inconspicuous.”

Aomine carefully steps away. “I think suspicion is the only thing that’s holding it together right now. Don’t worry, I’ll find a car.”

“You mean steal one,” Tetsu calls after him.

“No.” Aomine rolls his eyes. “Yes. What do you think I’m gonna do? Go to the nearest car dealership and buy one? In case you haven’t noticed, my funds are rather limited.”

“Don’t take anything too flashy, okay?”

“Sure!”

\---

_”A BMW is what you call inconspicuous?”_

“It’s an old model,” Aomine replies, sipping his coffee and slipping lower into the decidedly non-Datsun-esque seat. “And it has airbags. That blue abomination didn’t even have a radio.”

 _”It does. It’s just... stuck on one station,”_ Tetsu mumbles. Aomine isn’t even sure he was meant to hear that. The quality of the audio feed with this earpiece is astounding. It has Aomine wondering what kind of second-hand crap they were using at the CIA the whole time, when technological masterpieces such as this were available.

Well, maybe there are some perks to working in the private sector.

“Okay, so.” Aomine wriggles into a comfortable position so that he can keep an eye on the pet store and the apartment above. “You seem to know a lot about me. What about you? Tell me something about you.”

There is silence on the other end of the line, and then, _”I don’t know. I’m not very interesting.”_

“Come on,” Aomine whines. “I’m sitting in a car, at 3:30 in the morning, running on my fourth coffee. I gotta have something to keep me awake.”

_”I doubt stories about me will do the trick.”_

“Now who’s selling themselves short, huh?” Aomine bites off a generous piece of the Kit-Kat he snuck out of the gas station before he came here. “Come on, there’s gotta be something. How about basketball? You said you played.”

More socially awkward silence ensues and Aomine realises he’s holding his breath.

_”Yes.”_

“O-kay.” Aomine nods slowly. This is going to take all night. “So. How come you went on to do... this? Whatever this is.”

_”Like I said, I wasn’t very good at it. I am better at this.”_

“You mean hacking into supposedly impregnable government systems? Yeah, I imagine that’s a rare skill.”

Tetsu stays quiet, although it has a vaguely miffed air about it.

Aomine tries to salvage the situation. “Okay, sorry. What I meant to say was: what position did you play?”

_”That’s not what you meant to say at all.”_

“Just answer the question, will you?”

Aomine could really do without the exasperated sigh that transpires crystal clear right into his auditory canal, but at least he’s getting an answer now.

_”Do you know what the 6th man is?”_

Aomine cracks up because _of course_.

_”I don’t know why you think that’s funny.”_

His laughter tails off into a low chuckle. “I was laughing because it fits. Providing support from the shadows, going where you’re needed, not being in the limelight - it’s not so different from what you’re doing right now, is it?”

Tetsu responds with contemplative silence.

“It suits you,” Aomine adds, peering through his binoculars at a group of hooded individuals rounding the corner.

“Wait, I think I’ve got something here.” Aomine pats down his pockets for his phone, simultaneously keeping an eye on the group.

 _”What is it?”_ Tetsu sounds alert, worried even. It makes Aomine smile because it’s completely unnecessary - unless Tetsu is worried for the crew of thugs, in which case he would be entirely justified.

Aomine squints through the spy glasses. “I don’t know, there’s a couple of guys walking towards the store and somehow I doubt they’re here to buy hamster food. I-... yep, they’ve got baseball bats. Talk to you later, Tetsu!”

He ends the phone call before Tetsu can object and carefully sneaks onto the street, using the parked cars for cover. Two street lamps are busted. They make for a convenient pool of darkness that Aomine can slip through to the other side of the street.

He swiftly steps into the small alleyway next to the store. It’s a dead end, mostly populated by trash cans and discarded delivery boxes.

The group is closing in from the other side and Aomine waits until they are almost at the store entrance before sticking his head out.

“Hey!” He hisses, waving his hand as glaringly inconspicuous as possible. “Psst, over here.”

There is some confusion among the group, but the tall guy in the front slowly walks over, followed by the rest.

“New orders from the boss,” Aomine whispers, beckoning them further into the alley.

“Who the hell are you?” The tall one snarls as soon as they are off the sidewalk. He towers over Aomine by half a head, which is pretty impressive, considering Aomine isn’t too short either.

But tall doesn’t always mean _better_.

Aomine casually positions himself with his back to one of the dumpsters. Sometimes fighting with your back against the wall isn’t as inadvisable as people think. If you know what you’re doing - and Aomine prides himself that he does - it simply removes one blind spot from the equation and keeps the rest of your opponents neatly in front of you.

“Okay, I lied.” Aomine presents them with a wide grin. “There are no new orders. In fact, I don’t even know who you’re working for.”

There is some collective evil chuckling, and the human mountain eyes Aomine like he’s an overripe melon. “Then what are you doing here?”

Aomine shrugs his shoulders. “I’ve come to ask you to quietly put down your weapons and go home. If you do that nobody will get hurt. Promise.”

The chuckling swells into ugly laughter.

“Oh boy,” Mountain Man says, in an annoyingly pitying tone, “you have no idea what you’ve gotten yourself into.”

Aomine tightens his grip on the pair of binoculars in his coat pocket. He figured he might need something hard to hit people with.

“Yeah. Same,” Aomine sighs, as the gangsters raise their weapons. Upon closer inspection, not all of them turn out to have baseball bats. Some came with pry bars and something that looks like a tire iron.

The lighting in the alley is crappy, but Aomine can see the signs of their attack just fine. The small tilt backwards that a raised weapon makes when an opponent is ready to charge, the noise of their shoes on the ground as they try for a better stance.

Amateurs.

Aomine ducks and the first baseball bat hits the bin behind him. The binoculars are out of his pocket in a split second and he snaps them forward on their cord.

They smash into the place just below the Yeti’s left kneecap. Sadly, the only thing that splinters are the lenses inside, but Aomine knows it will hurt like a bitch.

The big guy wails and stumbles to the side. He aims another disoriented, angry swing at Aomine, but that results in Aomine getting a hold of the baseball bat and whacking him in the jaw with it.

The thugs regroup; now two of them are coming at him at once, which is usually a bad move. Lack of coordination can be your biggest enemy in a fight.

Aomine sends the baseball bat spinning into one attacker’s direction. It doesn’t even have to hit but nothing says _’Abort! Abort!’_ like a baseball bat aimed at your face.

It stalls the guy, which gives Aomine enough time to tackle the other to the ground. The tire iron clatters away and ends up underneath the dumpster. Good - where he can’t reach it, they can’t either.

Fights in small spaces are hardly ever a good idea if there are more than two persons involved. Especially when the target is a single individual - lots of opportunities to miss and accidentally decimate your own side.

It takes a damned lot of practice to coordinate a fight with multiple people, and these idiots obviously skipped that course.

The two remaining members of the group have to helplessly stand by as Aomine knees their buddy in the nether regions and then knocks him out with a well-placed and binoculars-enforced hook.

They seem to heavily contemplate switching careers when Aomine looks back up.

“What are you standing there for?” the tall guy, though still hopping around on one foot, bellows. “Go get him!”

Aomine is faster; he twirls the binoculars a couple of times on their cord and releases them at the chest of one of the perps. It’s not forceful enough to break bone, but it knocks the wind out of him just fine.

The man staggers, coughing and gasping for air as his partner continues the assault with an attempt to club Aomine in the ribs.

A small side-step takes care of the blunt force of the impact and allows Aomine to lock the baseball bat in his grasp, twisting it out of the man’s hands.

Now empty-handed, he scrambles away and watches in wide-eyed horror as Aomine casually swings the baseball bat into the second attacker’s abdomen without even looking.

A hefty kick to the head later leaves only two gangsters still standing.

Well.

One and a half, really.

The Yeti is somewhat up on his feet and levelling a semi-automatic at Aomine.

“Who the fuck are you?” he screams.

“A gun? Really?” Aomine shakes his head. “You make me sad.”

The guy hobbles closer. “Tell me who you are so that I know what to write on your fucking grave stone.”

Aomine inclines his head, eyes narrowed as if in thought. “How about ‘Sorry, false grave’?”

Then he throws the baseball bat. It knocks the gun right out of the man’s hand while Aomine kicks out and catches the other perp in the gut. A pained grunt tells Aomine he didn’t miss. He shifts and brings his knee up to meet the giant’s chin.

Both gangsters topple over and Aomine dashes for the dropped gun, carefully dangling it from two fingers as the tall one looks up at him. His expression says he’s prepared to die, but Aomine has no plans to kill anyone tonight. Or ever again, for that matter.

“You should have just left.” Aomine heaves a sigh and knocks the guy out with the handle of the gun.

“Nope.” Aomine aims at the last man standing who is trying to sneak up on him. The guy freezes, holding up his hands.

“Please, just-”

“Oh, don’t crap your pants,” Aomine snorts, disabling the gun. “I wasn’t gonna shoot you.”

When the guy visibly relaxes, Aomine gives him a quizzical look. “Never said I wouldn’t punch you though.”

And then it’s lights out for that one, too.

\---

By the time the police show up, Aomine is already parked three blocks away, going through the thugs’ wallets.

“Hey, if I give you a bunch of names can you run them and find out who they’re working for?” Aomine says, examining the driver’s license he’s holding.

 _”Provided it’s their real names, yes,”_ Tetsu replies, to the sound of keys clacking in the background.

Aomine grins. “Don’t worry, I took pictures too. Coming right up.”

He sends everything he’s got to the number saved as ‘Base’ and immediately renames it to ‘Tetsu’ because he is fucking done with faceless numbers.

Then he digs through the tiny mountain of cell phones on the passenger seat, selecting one at random and finding it locked. “I’ve got their cell phones too. You think you can get something off of them?”

The clacking stops for a moment.

_”Sure, but is there anything you didn’t take?”_

Aomine goes through his mental checklist. “Their shirts.”

He can practically hear the suspension dots on the other end of the line.

 _”What, exactly, did you do with them?”_ Tetsu finally asks, somewhat reluctantly.

Aomine picks up another phone but with similar outcome. “I didn’t kill anyone, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

_”I wasn’t, but go on.”_

“I took their shoes and pants and burnt them.” Aomine gives up on the cell phones and instead continues munching on the rest of the abandoned Kit-Kat. “You would be surprised how compliant a man gets when his pants are missing. Also, I taped them all to a lamp post. The police should be able to handle it from there.”

If Aomine were to guess, he would say Tetsu’s silence is slightly judgemental at this point.

“What?” Aomine shrugs, dusting crumbles off his pant., “At least they’re certainly not gonna try anything in the near future. Not with the police around. You should thank me. Our favourite couple is safe for tonight.”

_”So you’re going home?”_

Aomine pauses in the middle of chewing. He was actually planning to sleep in the car since he is technically homeless - especially now that his latest alias was shot down, too.

“I- uhm... yeah,” he says, instead. “I’ve got a room at a motel off the island.”

_”You know, there is a cot in one of the locker rooms over here.”_

Aomine gapes at the windshield for lack of a Tetsu to stare at. “Are you asking me to sleep at your place?”

_”First of all, I wasn’t asking. I was pointing out a useful fact. And secondly, this is not my place. This is a gym. I don’t sleep here.”_

In all honesty, Aomine wouldn’t have put it past Tetsu to sleep cuddled up to his computers. But this also means Tetsu does have a proper home somewhere. Now, only to find out _where_.

Still, Aomine doubts the gym came equipped with a bed in the locker room.

“Then why do you have a cot in there? Did it just magically pop up one day?”

 _”It’s from back when I set this up,”_ Tetsu mumbles. _”Before I installed the security system.”_

“Aw, you didn’t want to leave your invention alone,” Aomine snickers.

Tetsu’s lack of response tells him he went a little too far this time. Maybe mocking isn’t exactly the way to gain Tetsu’s trust.

Then again, it’s not like it’s any easier to gain Aomine’s.

“I didn’t mean it like that, okay?” Aomine sort-of-apologizes. “I meant it... in a cute way. It’s cute.”

This seems to make it even worse. There’s a small click and the line goes dead.

Aomine blinks and checks his phone. The screen remains stubbornly locked and devoid of running phone calls.

“Great.” Aomine slumps back and pulls his coat tighter around him. It’s going to be a long night.


	5. Chapter 5

He will swear until his last dying breath that he did not get surprised by a small blue-haired man in an orange parka knocking on his passenger side window.

“Bzwuh?” Aomine sputters and immediately reaches for where his gun would have been. Tetsu is lucky he doesn’t roll that way anymore.

Tetsu knocks again and points at a paper pulp tray holding two coffees.

“What are you doing here?” Aomine grumbles, wiping sleep from his eyes. He unlocks the door and Tetsu scrambles in, tugging his oversized shoulder bag with him.

Tetsu offers him one of the cups. “I thought you might like some breakfast.”

Aomine frowns but accepts the coffee anyway. The need for caffeine is greater than his suspicion.

Meanwhile, Tetsu fishes out a brown paper bag and dangles it in front of Aomine’s face. “Bagel?”

“Oh my god, yes.” Aomine snatches the bag and seconds later indulges in quite possibly the best bagel he’s ever had. A Kit-Kat will only get you so far, after all.

“You know,” Aomine says, around a chunk of bagel in his mouth, “I should be mad at you.”

Tetsu’s eyes go wide - which is an immensely impressive move, given that his eyes already take up approximately half his face. “What for?”

Aomine waves the paper napkin at the pet store a few yards ahead. He returned early this morning after the cops had left to get a good look at their targets. Or customers, or whatever Tetsu wants to call them.

“I expected a nice pair of boobs to make up for my trouble last night,” he laments, “and instead I get two pairs of balls.”

Tetsu looks as if at least one of those words is giving him trouble.

“You failed to mention that Kiyoshi’s fiancé is a dude.”

“And what difference does it make?” Tetsu inquires, and Aomine can’t tell if he’s being serious or not. It’s generally rather hard to tell.

“Well, I just-...,” Aomine trails off, and his shoulders sag when he glances at Tetsu. Fine, so he _was_ being serious. “None,” he admits, eventually.

“His name is Hyūga Junpei,” Tetsu elaborates. “I’m sure it was in the files I showed you.”

Aomine grimaces, trying to catch a piece of onion sticking out of the corner of his mouth with his tongue. “I shtopped reading after the firsht dude.”

Tetsu shoots him a look that conveys his thoughts about Aomine’s work ethic - it’s nothing favourable.

“They’ve been together since high school,” Tetsu goes on, as if Aomine actually wanted to know that. Aomine pretends not to notice the solemn expression on his face. This is teetering into the _feelings_ area, which has always been thin ice for Aomine, and he absolutely does not want to find out what’s underneath.

He swallows his mouthful of bagel and clears his throat. “So, what did you find out about the guys from last night?”

He pokes Tetsu in the shoulder when he doesn’t react. Tetsu blinks at him for a moment, but then perks up and starts extracting a netbook from his bag. Aomine eyes the bag and wonders what else is in there. Probably the gateway to Narnia or some shit.

The screen flares to life. Tetsu must have had it on sleep mode, because the files pop up almost instantly.

“Two of them were using fake names.” Tetsu clicks through the documents - police case files for the most part. “But with the pictures you sent, I was able to ID them anyway.”

Aomine leans over to follow Tetsu’s explanations. He isn’t sure whether to be disappointed or delighted that Tetsu doesn’t flinch when their shoulders bump together. The little guy seems to trust him quite a bit.

That is so odd.

“How come it takes you like five minutes to run a face trace and the FBI needs about a hundred years to find anyone?” Aomine gestures at the screen, licking traces of sour cream from his fingers.

Tetsu shrugs. “I don’t get paid by the hour.”

“Neither do they, but I see your point.”

“Anyway,” Tetsu continues, “I was able to connect them all to this man.”

He turns the netbook towards Aomine.

“Hanamiya Makoto,” Aomine reads as he quickly skims over the file. “Wow. Charmer.”

Tetsu gives a somewhat miserable nod and hauls the netbook back onto his lap. “He runs the local gang and he’s been expanding his territory in the last few years. He’s been associated with multiple break-ins, kidnappings, destruction of property, and two murders in the area but the police haven’t been able to make anything stick. He’s smart.”

“Well, then.” Aomine grins and finishes the last piece of bagel in one go. “Let’sh be shmarter.”

“Wait, where are you going?” Tetsu puts a hand on his arm.

Aomine flops back into his seat. “Look, I think I’ve got this figured out. There’s a lot of small shops in this neighbourhood. Most of them have been around for generations. I bet a lot of them don’t want to leave. And many of them simply _can’t_.”

Tetsu’s brow furrows in contemplation. “You’re thinking extortion.”

“Exactly. That’s why they wanted to smash up the store last night. I’ll bet the pair of pants I’m wearing that your man Kiyoshi here refused to pay. And two broken legs is what he got in return.”

“But then why is he still refusing?” Tetsu muses.

It’s Aomine’s turn to shrug. “That’s what I was going to find out. Some people are idiots.”

“And some people stand up to bullies.” Tetsu glances down at his netbook.

“Yeah.” Aomine rolls his eyes and finally gets out of the car, “That’s just idiocy in disguise.”

“You do the same thing.”

“I never said I was particularly wise,” Aomine smirks, and heads off towards the pet store.

\---

“Hi! There anything I can help you with?”

Aomine turns his attention from a truckload of different dog foods to the young man addressing him. It’s not Kiyoshi, so Aomine assumes he is looking at the better half.

“Hey,” Aomine fakes a smile and tries to come up with something that might get him a proper tour of the premises, “yeah, I was wondering, do you have any airline approved pet carriers?”

He doesn’t see any, so they must be in the back. The front part of the store is relatively small, stacked almost up to the ceiling with toys, cans of pet food, and other small-ish items. The larger goods have to be stored elsewhere, Aomine presumes. He hears barking and chirping from the back, but it sounds distant, as if through a closed door.

“Sure.” Hyūga beckons him towards the rear exit. “What’s it for?”

“A dog.”

Hyūga shoots him a glance over his shoulder. It is full of disapproval. “I meant what _type_ of dog. What breed.”

Fine - perhaps Aomine should have spent more time researching small domesticated animals.

“Uhm. “ The only thing that comes to mind is Tetsu, God knows why. “I don’t know. He’s a mix, I think? Kind of a lithe build. A bit shy. Peculiar color.”

Hyūga laughs as they come to stand in front of a shelf stuffed full of carriers in about as many variations as there are pets. “You’re looking for a matching colour, huh?”

“Not really.” Aomine doesn’t see a bright blue one anyway. Besides, he’s busy mapping out the building’s blueprints in his head.

“Okay, so what exactly did you have in mind?” Hyūga starts checking the tags on random carriers.

 _Something that you can fit a computer in_ , Aomine thinks, but acts as if he’s examining the products.

“Nothing specific.” At least that much is true. “Hit me with your best shot.”

Hyūga doesn’t roll his eyes, but he clearly wants to. Meanwhile, Aomine notes that there are two exits in the back, one probably leading out into the yard or towards the animals, and the other upstairs into the apartment.

“Hey, did you hear the sirens last night?” Aomine asks casually, while Hyūga pulls out carriers for him to inspect.

“You bet we did. They found some members of a street gang right over there in the alley.” He seems highly irritated, but Aomine can’t spot any signs of secretiveness. “They were all unconscious, though. And their pants were gone. Wonder what kind of mugging _that_ was.”

A successful one, as far as Aomine is concerned.

“Oh, wow. That’s literally right outside your door. And you’re not worried?”

Hyūga runs a hand through his hair, sighing. “Look, Mister, no offense, but do you want to buy a carrier or not?”

Aomine means to respond when the door to the stairs opens and something vaguely human-shaped wobbles out. It’s Kiyoshi, but Aomine’s come out of torture looking better than that.

Both his legs are in casts, two fingers of his left hand are taped together, and his face is a colour palette. And that’s just what is visible. God knows how he looks underneath the sweater and the cut off sweatpants.

“Oh! Sorry!” Kiyoshi smiles, but it looks more pained than friendly. “I didn’t mean to interrupt.”

“What are you doing, idiot?” Hyūga snaps and hurries to catch Kiyoshi when he threatens to lose his balance. He’s having trouble grasping the crutches, Aomine notices.

“Sorry,” Kiyoshi laughs. “It’s just so boring up there all on my own that I thought I’d come down here to keep you company.”

“I’m fine.” Hyūga seems intent on shoving his fiancé back upstairs.

“What happened to you?” Aomine suddenly finds himself asking. He gets two very different reactions - Kiyoshi looks wary, and Hyūga is basically fuming.

“Some assholes mugged him a couple weeks back,” Hyūga replies, the nerve in his jaw twitching with barely contained rage. “Not two blocks from here. Damned bastards!”

“Now, now,” Kiyoshi tries to placate his partner, albeit with limited success. “It’s not as bad as it looks. I’ll be as good as new in a few months.”

Aomine remembers Tetsu’s words. Either Kiyoshi is the most positive person Aomine has ever met, or the blindest.

“Well, good luck then.” Aomine feigns an encouraging smile. Kiyoshi seems to sense that he doesn’t mean it, but the thing about having two fakers in the room is that neither is going to admit that they are.

“You sure it was a mugging, though?” Aomine asks, like it’s an afterthought. Kiyoshi goes stock-still, while Hyūga’s anger is slowly focusing on Aomine.

“What the hell else would it be?” Hyūga snaps. “They took his wallet, his watch, his-” he lets out a little breath, “-his engagement ring.”

“Ey, it’s not so bad.” Kiyoshi fumbles his arm free and hugs Hyūga close. “We can always buy a new one. It’s just a ring.”

Aomine has put his foot in his mouth often enough - he’s going for a new record with Tetsu - to know what it sounds like when you sink a conversation.

Hyūga’s eyes narrow into tiny slits behind his glasses before he starts flailing his hands in aggravation. “It’s not just a ring, you moron! That’s not how it’s supposed to go! You’re not supposed to buy each other engagement rings every other week like they’re coming out of bubblegum machines.”

Kiyoshi sways once he loses the support of Hyūga’s shoulder, the crutch clatters to the floor, and Aomine is preparing to take either one to the hospital any minute now.

Surprisingly, Hyūga’s ire dissipates as fast as it came and he manages to hold Kiyoshi upright before anyone can break any more bones.

“Uhm,” he groans under Kiyoshi’s weight when he reaches for the crutch. “Can you excuse us for a second? I need to get this big oaf here back upstairs.”

Aomine can’t say he’s upset about getting an opportunity to get out of here without having to use the last of his petty cash to buy a carrier for a dog he doesn’t have. He frantically pats his pockets and acts surprised. “Shit, you know what? I think I forgot my wallet anyway. Must have left it in the car.”

The couple gives him bemused looks.

“Ah, why don’t you go ahead and I’ll just come back another time, okay?” Aomine subtly moves towards the exit.

Hyūga shrugs, “Suit yourself.”

“Thanks, though.” Aomine excuses himself with a small wave. “And good luck with the healing thing.”

He jogs out of the store before either of them can reply. Admittedly, that wasn’t his smoothest exit, but he got what he wanted, and it would have been ten times more embarrassing if he’d revealed his lack of money at the counter.

He feels like he owes them a purchase though.

When he gets back to the car, Tetsu has already stowed his laptop away and is giving him an expectant look.

“So, what did you learn?”

Aomine wriggles into the driver’s seat. “Well, for one, they are so ridiculously in love I thought I was gonna puke rainbows. And secondly, your man Kiyoshi there? He’s keeping secrets. He didn’t tell his fiancé what this assault was about.”

Tetsu doesn’t seem to be a fan of this approach, but leaves it be for now. “What’s your plan then?”

Aomine shrugs and starts the car. “I’d keep a close eye on Hyūga.”

“You think they will come after him?” Tetsu looks shocked. Precious.

“It’s what I would do,” Aomine replies nonchalantly, as he swerves into traffic.

“Where are we going?” Tetsu pipes up suddenly, frowning at the streets outside.

“First of all, I need a shower. And you,” Aomine gestures at the trunk, “will want to get to work on the bag of cell phones I got off the guys last night. Maybe you can find something we can use against this Hanamiya character.”

Tetsu gives a contemplative nod. He’s quiet for a few minutes, but he is staring so intently out of the window that Aomine fears he might be developing telekinetic powers on the spot.

“Anything wrong?” Aomine asks.

“No.” Tetsu squirms in his seat like a school kid in the principal’s office. “I was just thinking-... it’s nothing.”

Aomine sighs. He hates phrases like that. The fact that they are spoken already denies their truth, so he would rather nobody say them at all and just get on with it. Then again, this has always been a tallish order in the spy business. If there’s anything in spades, it’s people not saying what they mean.

“Spit it out.”

“I was just thinking,” Tetsu shoots him a hesitant glance, “the showers in the locker rooms do still work.”

Aomine almost laughs out loud. He thought it was something life altering that Tetsu was worried about.

“You just wanna see me naked,” Aomine grins. He adds a wink for good measure, but all he gets in return is vaguely embarrassed silence.

“It-... that was a joke, okay?” Aomine tries to remedy the sudden dip in atmosphere. “I didn’t really think you would-... I mean, obviously, right?”

Tetsu shrugs his shoulders, which Aomine has no idea how to interpret, and seems to find the dashboard terribly interesting. “You weren’t too thrilled when I offered you a place to sleep last night, so I thought maybe you don’t want-”

“ _That’s_ what we’re talking about here?” Aomine is slightly uneasy to find that he was actually entertaining the thought of Tetsu fancying him, somehow. And he’s even more horrified when he realises he is disappointed to be wrong.

“What did you think I meant?” Tetsu’s wide-eyed look speaks of nothing but genuine confusion.

“I-... uh...” Aomine tries to come up with an answer that will get him out of the ditch he’s just dug for himself, and fails. “Nothing. Shower would be great, thanks.”


	6. Chapter 6

“Hey.”

Aomine blinks blearily at Tetsu, who is either holding a mug of freshly-brewed coffee or his hand is on fire.

“Hey,” he replies, scrambling up from the cot and into a seated position. “How long did I sleep?”

“Just a couple of hours.”

Aomine gladly accepts the beverage. He hadn’t even meant to fall asleep. He’d flopped down on the cot to rest his back for a bit after his shower, and then suddenly it’s evening and Tetsu has made him coffee. Only one of these things is a pleasant surprise.

It appears he was more worn out than he had thought. Aomine has to strain his memory to remember a night when he had closed his eyes without the ever-present concern of being found or having to defend himself.

And he is beginning to seriously doubt that Tetsu means him any harm. If he did, this would have been his chance. Either that, or Tetsu is a particularly cruel asshole.

“Find anything in the meantime?” Aomine follows Tetsu back into the gym hall. Good thing he had fallen asleep in his clothes - otherwise, this would have been considerably more awkward. On the other hand, maybe not, because he hasn’t changed in three days and it’s high time he stole some new clothes.

“Not much, I’m afraid.” Tetsu pulls up his chair and beckons Aomine closer. “I dug through the cell phones you gave me, but only one of them showed multiple calls to and from the same number. Which I found interesting, so I checked it out.”

He brings up a new file. “The number belongs to this man: Seto Kentarō. He seems to be one of Hanamiya’s closer associates.”

Aomine leans in to read the stats. The man looks like he eats gravel for breakfast.

“ _Assault, assault with a deadly weapon, destruction of public property, reckless endangerment, assaulting a police officer, suspect in six murder cases-_... How the hell is this guy still at large?”

“Witnesses tend to go missing, apparently.” Tetsu points at a name on the screen. “I got this man’s number a couple of months ago. I couldn’t do anything.”

Aomine gets ready to try and soothe him, but instead of tears or rage, Tetsu’s expression merely reflects sadness and a certain air of determination. That’s either a very good front or Tetsu’s more collected than Aomine would have given him credit for.

“Well, I guess it’s time I paid these guys a visit.” Aomine gulps down a generous amount of coffee and grabs his coat which had mysteriously ended up hanging next to Tetsu’s on the rings.

“Is that wise?” Tetsu muses. “You can’t take on all of them.”

“I never said that, did I?” Aomine smirks. “Just send me any address you can find that links these two, and I’ll do the rest.”

Tetsu hits a couple of keys. “Done.”

Aomine pulls up the message and shakes his head, grinning, “Tell me again why you never worked for the CIA?”

“I never said that, did I?”

Aomine blinks. Then he laughs, so genuinely that it surprises even him.

\---

He doesn’t steal a car this time. Hanamiya’s hideout is on a relatively busy street so he couldn’t park there, anyway. Besides, there is a bus stop not too far from the bar Hanamiya seems to be operating out of, so it’s easy enough to pretend he’s just waiting.

About twenty minutes after Aomine has taken up his position at the corner, he notices some commotion by the door. Half a dozen men, including Hanamiya himself and his right-hand man Kentarō, step out onto the street.

There is a lot of hand-shaking and back-patting, and some heavy chumming up on Hanamiya’s part, as far as Aomine can see. The center of attention appears to be a comparatively small redhead in a fine suit, who has a gigantic fellow with long hair constantly at his heels.

Aomine knows a boss when he sees one.

He pulls out his cell phone, aiming the camera at the group under cover of his arm. “Hey, Tetsu, you there?”

_”Always.”_

“One of these days I will have to explain the meaning of ‘creepy’ to you,” Aomine sighs, though a little amused. “If I send you a picture, can you identify someone for me?”

_”Sure.”_

He takes a few in case some are blurry or just feature backsides and sends them to Tetsu. “I want to know who the tiny redhead is. Judging by the way Hanamiya is leaving a trail of slime around him, he’s got to be a big fish.”

_”I’m on it.”_

“Okay, tell me when you’ve got someth-” Aomine pauses and squints at the guy crossing the street. He is walking straight up to Aomine.

And he looks inconveniently familiar.

“Detective Kagami,” Aomine says, with a fake smile, quickly ending the call to Tetsu. “What a surprise. What are you doing here?”

“Funny,” Kagami answers, his smile equally sharp. “I was about to ask you the same question. Long way from Wall Street, isn’t it?”

Well, shit. The last thing he needs right now is a cop for a stalker.

Aomine steps aside so that Kagami isn’t in his line of sight to the bar. “Actually, I quit that job. Too stressful.”

“Yeah, I imagine playing Superman in the subway is a lot more relaxing.”

“You seem to still be upset about this,” Aomine sneers. “You need to let things go, detective. You’ll develop a stomach ulcer if you keep that up.”

“I’ll let things go when I’m done.” Kagami’s entire set of eyebrows draws together in a scowl. “And I’m not done with you.”

Aomine heaves a dramatic sigh. “Was there anything specific you wanted, detective?”

Kagami’s grin at this point is deceptively casual. “As a matter of fact, yes. A couple of low-lives were found beaten up in an alley not too far from here last night. You wouldn’t know anything about that, would you?”

“As flattered as I am that you seem to think I’m going to single-handedly clean up the city, no, I don’t.”

Kagami shakes his head, laughing, and circles Aomine like a hungry wolf. It’s mighty annoying because that means Aomine is forced to turn his back on the group in front of the bar. It _also_ means Kagami might figure out why Aomine is here.

He has long given up hope that Kagami might be stupid.

“It’s funny, you know?” Kagami’s smile takes on a dangerous edge. “Because all five of them swear the guy looked just like you.”

“I have a very generic face.”

“You really, really don’t.”

“Are you flirting with me, detective?” Aomine leers. He’s only half joking. Kagami isn’t too bad from a visual standpoint, and besides, after months and months of limited human contact, Aomine would do with pretty much anything that has a great ass.

Bodily needs notwithstanding, it often helps to make someone uncomfortable in order to get rid of them. Sadly, Kagami’s threshold for ambiguous comments is unexpectedly high.

“Take it as you will, but a guy like you is hard to mistake,” Kagami growls.

Aomine goes for the scandalised victim routine. “What, are you going to believe a bunch of gangsters rather than an upstanding citizen?”

Kagami barks out a laugh that has some passers-by regarding them curiously. “Upstanding? I kinda doubt that seeing as how you _don’t even exist_. You’re not a citizen of this country. Hell, as far as I can tell, you’re not a citizen _anywhere_.”

Well, at least it’s out in the open now. Aomine swallows, hoping Kagami won’t notice his slip in character.

So Kagami isn’t quite as inept at his job as Aomine would have liked. The unpleasant question is: Did he accidentally give Aomine away with his inquiries?

“You must have spelled my name wrong, then, because I can assure you _I exist_.” Aomine tries a clever smile but it’s not taking, and getting out of here is looking more and more appealing. He cranes his neck to see if there is a bus coming - any bus will do - but the street is packed with nothing but cars. _Damn._.

“No, I did not fucking misspell your name.” Kagami is fuming now and attracting far too much attention. “I want to know who the fuck you are. You sure as hell aren’t with any government agency I’ve ever heard of, and believe me, I’ve tried them all.”

Aomine’s mind is racing. The Agency may have deleted him from the system, but that doesn’t mean no one will recognize his face in a picture. And if Kagami’s file lands in the wrong hands, Aomine might as well start running right away.

But not all is lost just yet. He has at least one more option than he had before, and that is Tetsu. He’ll have to ask Tetsu to track down any suspicious activity on the net regarding his person. Aomine’s pretty sure Tetsu could find his keys from three states over, so that shouldn’t be too hard for the little guy.

Meanwhile, Aomine does what he’s been trained to do: deny everything until further notice.

“I honestly don’t know what to tell you, detective.” He spreads his arms as if to prove that he’s real. “I’m me, and if you don’t believe me, you’ll have to arrest me, I guess.”

“See, that’s the thing,” Kagami grumbles. “I can’t. I can’t arrest a guy that doesn’t exist.”

He looks hesitant and Aomine senses an opening.

“But...?” Aomine suggests cautiously. He is basically admitting that Kagami is right. It’s a dangerous game he’s playing, but something tells him that at this point he might get further with the truth than constant denial. It may also be a lot quieter.

“ _But_...” Kagami pokes his finger at Aomine’s chest. “If I catch you practicing ‘your reflexes’ again anywhere even near my precinct, I swear I will just make a up a name for you and run you through that system like you’re a fucking treadmill, understood?”

So much for the path of truth. Aomine decides to make a u-turn before the flaming depths of Kagami’s anger can set his pants on fire.

“Detective, I told you I don’t know anything about-”

Kagami groans as if Aomine’s stubbornness is causing him actual physical pain. “Go. Home. Before I change my mind and arrest you right here.”

Aomine gestures at the bus stop sign above their heads. “I’m trying to.”

Kagami makes a face that expresses how much he is not buying it. He glares at Aomine for a moment, but then moderates his temper and merely heaves an exasperated sigh.

He steps into Aomine’s personal space, and the only thing that saves him from a broken neck is the fact that killing a police officer in public will not exactly improve Aomine’s situation. So Aomine keeps his hands where they are, and pretends he can’t think of thirty-six ways to incapacitate a person at this proximity. It helps that Kagami smells kind of nice - makes it a bit more worthwhile.

“Piece of friendly advice.” Kagami puts his hand on Aomine’s shoulder and nods his head in the direction of the bar. “Stay out of this. You can deny being involved in the incident last night all you want, but these guys won’t care. They’ll be _glad_ that you don’t exist, because that makes it easier to dispose of your body. Go home. Leave the big ones to us.”

 _God fucking damn it._ No regular detective has any right to be that good. Aomine decides he really doesn’t like that about Kagami.

“I’m sorry, detective, I’m not following.” Aomine brushes Kagami’s hand from his shoulder.

Kagami waves it off. “Save it.”

He walks away without so much as saying good-bye, which is not only rude, but also goes against Aomine’s policy of having the last word.

“Hey, detective?” Aomine calls after him. “Just out of curiosity, were you observing them or me?”

Kagami grimaces and gives him the finger.

“Is that an invitation?” Aomine grins, while Kagami merely shakes his head and disappears around the corner.

The smirk on Aomine’s face remains for quite a while, even as he resumes the phone call with Tetsu.

“Hey. I just had a curious encounter with our favourite detective.”

_”I know. The store to your right has a video camera.”_

Aomine turns around, eyeing the camera. It seems to stare back. He knows what can be done with security systems from experience, but until now, that’s all it was - _a system_. Little blips, bytes, some wiring, and a lens. And now, it suddenly has a face and a voice, and Aomine isn’t sure if that makes it weirder or more reassuring.

He shakes his head at the camera, smiling, before turning back around to continue looking like a hard-working man on his way home. “So, got anything on the redhead?”

_”Yes. You are not going to like this.”_

“It’s been a long time since I actually liked anything, Tetsu,” Aomine sighs. “Just give me what you’ve got.”

 _”I’ve sent it to your phone.”_ And indeed, the cell phone in Aomine’s pocket buzzes with a new message. He opens the file and scrolls through the contents, frowning.

 _”His name is Akashi Seijuuro,”_ Tetsu goes on, when Aomine fails to comment. _”You were right, he is not just a big fish. He’s-”_

“A whale?” Aomine finishes the sentence.

Tetsu hums in agreement. _”Something like that.”_

“Looks like we’ve caught us a Great White, huh?” Aomine’s grin grows a little sharper. Now _there’s_ a challenge.

 _”I’m afraid I can’t share your enthusiasm.”_ The documents on Aomine’s screen begin to shuffle around as if by magic, and Aomine has to wonder if there is anything that Tetsu can’t hack. _”The police have tried to pin no less than seven murders on him over the years, but nothing ever made it to trial.”_

“Let me guess.” Aomine skims over the police reports Tetsu opened for him. “Witnesses went missing?”

_”No, not at all. There never were any to begin with. He’s been a suspect in at least three separate Interpol cases. But every time the police or any other agency have taken an interest, their investigation just... turns towards somebody else or stops altogether. I don’t know how he is doing it, to be honest. It’s almost as if-”_

“As if he’s one step ahead,” Aomine concludes, grimly. The smile has faded from his lips. Challenges are good and Aomine’s never backed down from one, but sometimes there is just nothing fun about them. Sometimes, they get you killed.

At least he’s already got experience with dying, so there’s that.

“What I don’t get is, why would someone like Akashi even meet with a small time gangster such as Hanamiya?” Aomine muses, after a moment of contemplative silence. “I mean, as far as I can tell Akashi’s got everything, from drug labs to finance geeks. The man owns half the police force, for crying out loud. So what does Hanamiya have that Akashi wants so bad he even deigns to come down here?”

_”I don’t know. But I may know a way to find out.”_

Aomine half-turns to the camera, arching one eyebrow. “And what’s that?”

For a moment, there is only the _clickety-clack_ noise of Tetsu’s light-speed typing.

_”Okay, I’ll need you to get close to Hanamiya.”_

“What for? To kick him in the balls?” Aomine would be lying if he said he wasn’t looking forward to that.

 _”No.”_ Tetsu’s tone is scolding, which amuses Aomine greatly. _”With a bit of luck, he’ll have the data connection on his phone switched on. You can pair his cell phone with yours and I’ll be able to access any feature we want. We can listen in on his conversations via the microphone.”_

Aomine glances at the entrance to the bar where Kentarō is taking the last few drags of his cigarette. “Hanamiya is back inside. This place is going to have surveillance. He’s gonna see me coming from a mile away.”

_”I thought you were the secret agent? Think of something.”_

“Ha-fucking-ha.” Aomine grimaces. “You know what? I’ve got a better idea.”

He fishes out his cell phone and clicks on the _’Force Pair’_ button which searches for all available devices in the vicinity. Aomine should be insulted that Tetsu apparently programmed this shit for a complete idiot.

The app finds one that matches in distance and signal strength. Aomine confirms and grins broadly when his screen flashes with the words _’Pairing successful’_. He knew Kentarō wouldn’t be clever enough to keep his data switched off.

“Done.” Aomine slips his cell phone back into his pocket. “You got that?”

 _”You think Hanamiya is going to talk to Kentarō about this?”_ Tetsu sounds a little disappointed, and now Aomine is definitely insulted.

“Kentarō is his right-hand man,” Aomine snaps. ”Trust me, they’re gonna talk. Even gangsters need partners.”

 _”You worked alone for over five years,”_ Tetsu chips in. It doesn’t even come across as judgemental - more like he’s correcting Aomine on some historical dates.

Nevertheless, it bugs Aomine, so he makes a miffed face at no one in particular and heads off across the street. “Yeah, but I’m not a gangster.”

_”Debatable.”_

“Bye, Tetsu,” he deadpans, and switches off the phone. He’s got places to be, anyway. Places he doesn’t want Tetsu to know about.


	7. Chapter 7

Aomine had tried not to think too much about Momoi and his upcoming meeting with her. Tetsu and his quest have kept him extra busy these last few days.

He had set a date far enough in the future to give Momoi time to make it to virtually any place on the planet without raising suspicion. The same goes for him, naturally.

But now that he’s heading over there, he’s getting anxious. He keeps wondering if she made it, if she even bothered to come. He wouldn’t blame her if she didn’t show. After all, he has not exactly been a model agent all these years.

He hopes their friendship is enough to make up for that, however shitty it may have been on his end.

He had picked a corner in Central Park that Momoi once told him she was particularly fond of. She probably thought he wasn’t listening back then.

It’s not a bad spot, either. The trees provide sufficient cover, and the nearest sniper spots are far enough away to require a really spectacularly good shot. Plus, at this time of the day, only a few people are still wandering around the park; mainly joggers, a bunch of people taking their dogs for a walk, but all in all, a tractable number.

Aomine casually strolls past the park bench once to check for unpleasant surprises. Unfortunately, he finds one.

The person sitting there is definitely _not_ Momoi. First of all: not nearly enough cleavage. And secondly, Aomine knows this guy.

Fucking Kise Ryōta.

For all Aomine knows, Kise is still an active agent with the CIA. They went through training together and even worked on assignments as partners for a while, but as with everything else concerning relationships, Aomine managed to fuck that up too.

Apparently, it is considered rude to sleep with your partner and then request to be reassigned.

Even for Kise’s near-angelic patience, that was a bit too much. The truth is, Aomine is only half the asshole everybody thinks he is. He remembers the morning he woke up next to Kise and thought, _’Thank God you’re still here.’_. That was pretty much the moment he high-tailed it out of there. Caring means vulnerability, and if there is one thing you don’t want to be when you end up in a bunker in North Korea, it is vulnerable.

They are both better off on their own, anyway.

Last Aomine heard, Kise was in deep cover somewhere in South Africa. Not that he had checked or anything; Momoi simply felt obligated to tell him, for whatever reason.

Either way, Aomine is not going to approach an active agent unarmed. Fortunately, he knows Kise likes to keep his gun tucked away in the back of his trousers.

He creeps up behind Kise - who is doing really shoddy observation work, by the way - taps him on the shoulder and uses Kise’s startled flinch to grab the weapon. For a moment, Aomine is tempted to call him on it, but he has more important things to worry about. For example:

“What are you doing here?” Aomine hisses, gun trained at Kise’s face.

Kise’s arms drop to his sides as if he’s forgotten what to do with them, and he merely stares at Aomine in something like disbelief. It slowly turns into more happiness than Aomine can stand.

“You-... You’re alive,” Kise whispers, like he’s afraid saying it out loud might pop his dream bubble. He seems completely unfazed by the gun aimed at his forehead.

Aomine doesn’t buy the act, though. He has worked with Kise, and if there is anyone in the CIA who can adopt a character like a second skin, it’s Kise.

“Answer the question.” Aomine doesn’t let up.

Kise gives him a perplexed look at first, but then realisation dawns on him. “You don’t know, do you?”

“Know _what_?”

Kise takes a tentative step towards him, but Aomine shakes his head in warning. “Aominecchi-”

“Don’t call me that,” Aomine snarls. He has never been fond of that nickname, but Kise does it to everyone, so it was hard to get him to stop.

It’s getting easier though, it seems, for Kise gives a resigned nod and remains where he is. He takes a deep breath, and when he looks up, Aomine isn’t so sure this whole thing is a setup anymore. Nobody is that good.

“Aomine... Satsuki is dead.”

“Bullshit.” It’s a knee-jerk reaction. Whatever Kise’s play is, this is not going to get him there.

“Aomine,” Kise implores with a heavy sigh. “I’m not lying. She’s dead. I wish I could-”

“Would you stop?” Aomine growls, adjusting his grip on the gun. His hands are cold and sweaty. “Nobody knew about this but her and me. So, either she told you, or the Agency sent you here.”

“Well, she did. In a way.” Kise reaches into the inside pocket of his jacket, but stops when Aomine indicates that rushed movements might not be a good idea right now.

He slows down and opens his jacket wide enough for Aomine to check whether he’s carrying any additional firearms. He’s not; instead he plucks a small piece of paper from his pocket and hands it to Aomine.

It’s a pink post-it, crumpled, with dark specks on it but still readable. Aomine recognises Momoi’s curly handwriting. It states today’s date and location.

“I found her,” Kise says, voice soft and low. “She called me, wanted to meet up. But when I arrived at her apartment, she was already dead.” He points at the paper. “This was in her hand.”

Aomine doesn’t understand. Momoi wouldn’t die on him. She is so fucking infatuated with him that she would return from the dead just to keep him out of trouble.

_She is not dead._

“She made sure I was the one to find her,” Kise goes on, when Aomine stays silent. “She knew I would come here in her stead. I owed it to her. And to you.”

Kise’s words barely register. All he can hear is a litany of _’Not dead. Not dead. Not dead.’_ and he hopes like hell it’s just inside his head.

“It’s good to see you,” Kise adds, after a while, and it finally shakes Aomine out of his stupor.

Grief is a foreign concept to him. He’s only ever been on the issuing end of it, and now he doesn’t know what to do with the pain in his chest. So he concentrates on what he knows - and that is survival.

He realises he’s crushed the note in his fist, hard enough to make his joints hurt when he eases up and shoves it into his pocket. His grip on the gun is steady again when he answers.

“Who else knows I’m here?”

“What?” Kise’s eyebrows draw together in confusion. “I told you, I came here because Satsuki-”

Aomine doesn’t want to hear it. He moves in and presses the barrel against Kise’s chest. “Who knows?”

Kise whacks his hand away but doesn’t even attempt to take back his gun. “No one, you ass!”

He’s genuinely angry now, Aomine can tell. Kise has a nasty habit of baring his soul to people he thinks he can trust. Aomine has no idea how he ended up on that list, but it sure makes things easier.

Aomine eyes him for another moment before taking a step back and flipping the gun around, offering it grip first to Kise.

Kise visibly relaxes. He reaches for his gun, but Aomine holds on tight and drags Kise close enough that their noses almost touch.

“If you tell anyone, I swear, I’m gonna find you, and I’m gonna cut off your dick and feed it to you,” Aomine growls.

Contrary to Aomine’s expectations, Kise doesn’t back down.

“Really?” Kise’s initial anger turns into disdain, the hints of relief and joy fading into cold, hard lines on his face. “That’s how you remember me? You think I’m gonna run back to the Agency and rat you out? You know what? Fuck you.”

He lets go of the handle as if burnt, glaring at Aomine who is, admittedly, stunned.

“She was my friend too, you know?” Kise shakes his head, his rage giving way to sorrow. “I thought you should hear it from a friend and not read about it in some newspaper. Because, believe it or not, I still consider you a friend. Or at least, I did.”

Kise shoves his hands into his jacket pockets and shoots Aomine one last glance before walking away. “Maybe I was wrong.”

“Hey! You forgot your gun,” Aomine shouts, but Kise doesn’t even turn around.

“Keep it!”

Aomine watches him disappear into the darkness provided by the trees. For a horrifying moment he even contemplates running after Kise, but his feet won’t move. And what for, anyway? Nothing that comes out of his mouth when it matters is ever right. He wants to know how people like Kise do it - caring so much and showing it, without fear of the consequences. It just makes you an easy target.

And Aomine hits bullseye each and every time.


	8. Chapter 8

He doesn’t go back to the gym. For a couple of hours, he doesn’t go _anywhere_ , actually. He just wanders aimlessly through the streets, fiddling with the small paper note in his pocket.

How do people deal with grief? How do they make it _go away_?

Aomine prefers problems that he can shoot. Or strangle, or stab, or at least punch in the face. This is horrible because it’s _him_. It’s inside his head and the only way to get rid of it is permanently, and that seems like an awfully cheap way out.

He needs something to focus on, something that won’t require too much thinking. He considers turning his phone back on to see if Tetsu called with news on their case, but decides against it. Tetsu will inevitably ask what happened, and the last thing Aomine wants to do is talk about it.

He walks by a basketball court and stops, watching the guys behind the fence play one-on-one. Some of them aren’t even half bad.

Aomine used to really like playing basketball when he was a kid. Momoi once asked him why he didn’t pursue it as a professional career. He’d just shrugged and probably said something inappropriate.

The truth is, he was too good. Even in high school it was pretty clear that no one in his age group could beat him, and playing against older teams in tournaments was impossible due to regulations. The only times he got close to the original thrill was when he played on the streets, because nobody cared about his age there. If you had the money, you were in.

But when it became obvious that this wouldn’t suffice anymore, he needed something else - a new challenge, something to become better at. And he found it in the form of a cheery yet sturdy CIA recruiter named Momoi Satsuki. She brought him into the Agency and gave him a new goal to work towards.

Basketball became a faint memory, but every once in awhile, he still played. It used to work well to clear his head.

He wonders if it will help now.

The matches stall when no one seems to be willing to play the tall, bald guy. He must be something like the king of the court, judging by everyone’s reluctance to go up against him. Aomine smiles grimly when he rounds the corner and steps through the gate.

“I’ll play you.” He motions for the tall guy, who eyes him with thinly veiled amusement.

“Go home, worker bee,” Baldy says. “This isn’t a white collar game.”

This is the second time tonight somebody has told him to go home. It is beginning to get annoying. And yet, Aomine can’t even blame him. To everyone else, he must look like a businessman who accidentally got off on the wrong side of the tracks.

“Tell you what.” Aomine fishes the last bundle of cash he’s got out of his pants pocket and holds it up. It’s not much, but he hopes it will be enough to pique their interest. “Fifty bucks says I can beat you anyway.”

Baldy waves him off. “I don’t even put my shoes on for fifty bucks.”

“That’s funny,” Aomine smirks, “because you seem to already be wearing them. So, I’m thinking you’re just scared I might whoop your ass.”

The guy is at least a head taller than Aomine, which becomes even more evident when he stalks up to Aomine and pokes him in the chest. “You think you can come here and talk shit on my court? I’m gonna wipe the floor with you, fuckhead.”

“Ball!” Baldy yells, as Aomine carefully folds up his coat to hide the weapon nestled in one of the pockets.

“First to get a two point difference wins,” His Eminence says, and lets the ball spin on his finger with a triumphant grin on his face.

Aomine rolls up his sleeves and inclines his head, squinting. “How about we make this interesting? Four points difference. And I’ll even let you have the first basket.”

Baldy blinks, and then doubles over in shrill laughter. “You’re nuts, man. It’s gonna be fun burying you.”

That’s droll, considering how many people Aomine’s already put in the ground.

“Give it your best shot,” Aomine shrugs, and gets into the defensive position before the basket.

His opponent gets to make one point, just as Aomine promised.

\---

Baldy throws his money down last, emphasising his opinion of Aomine by spitting on the ground. He marches off in a huff, leaving Aomine alone on the court.

It had started to rain during the last minutes of their match and it is gradually getting stronger now. Aomine doesn’t kid himself into thinking the weather is what made people leave.

He crouches down and peels the dollar bills off the wet asphalt. He walks over to the hoop and sticks them onto the post one by one.

It was never about the money. He just needed the distraction. Anyone who happens to come by can have it, provided they manage to pull the bills off the metal without ripping them apart.

Aomine is an asshole, after all.

He sits down on the makeshift stands and pretends the rain pounding down on him is Momoi smacking him over the head for something stupid he did. And if some of it is a little salty, that’s just as well.

“Hey.”

The word is tiny and reluctant, barely carrying over to Aomine over the sound of the rain. He recognises it just fine, though.

“Hey.” Aomine looks up and finds Tetsu standing a few feet away, dressed in a transparent rain poncho with a bright blue umbrella in his hand. For someone who likes to avoid exposure, he really doesn’t comprehend the ways of subtlety.

“I put a tracker on your coat,” Tetsu says, hesitant. “Sorry.”

Aomine smiles, and for once, it’s not meant to scare someone. “Yeah, I figured something like that.”

He walks up to Aomine but still keeps a courteous distance. “I was worried.”

And indeed, he looks the part. It’s weird not hearing it as a platitude or as a means to make Aomine feel guilty.

“I’m fine,” Aomine replies. He hasn’t told such a shitty lie since he was fourteen and stole their neighbour’s canary to paint it orange.

“You don’t look fine,” Tetsu states.

Aomine laughs, low under his breath, and gathers his coat and jacket. “I’m a spy, Tetsu, remember? I never look the way I feel.”

Tetsu cocks his head to the side as if trying to solve an equation. He dips his umbrella back a bit when Aomine stands up and frowns. “Do you want to tell me?”

“Tell you what?” Aomine means to wrestle into his coat, but it is soaking wet by now and that’s not going to keep him warm. He slings it over his arm, instead.

“Why you don’t look fine.”

Aomine pauses and, for a moment, he is actually tempted to tell Tetsu. But that would include talking about how Momoi isn’t around anymore and he can’t guarantee that he isn’t going to want to shoot something afterwards. Preferably whoever killed Momoi.

So he simply shakes his head ‘no’. “Not really.”

Tetsu gives him a long pensive look and clearly wants to ask again, but eventually seems to decides against it.

“I overheard a conversation between Hanamiya and Kentarō,” he says, instead. “He’s looking for a hitman.”

Aomine heaves a sigh. He feared Tetsu would want to go back to business as usual. Even if it’s just to provide some comfort for Aomine. In all honesty, Aomine wishes it was that easy, but if Kise can find him, the Agency might be able to as well. Granted, Kise had help from Momoi, but no spy has ever survived on the motto _‘Oh, it was just this one time’_.

Tetsu doesn’t need to get dragged into this.

“Look.” Aomine studies the concrete between them with enormous interest. “I don’t know if I can do this much longer.”

“Why?” Tetsu peeks up at him, genuinely intrigued.

“The CIA is gonna find me sooner or later.” He cleverly circumnavigates the explanation of how he has arrived at this conclusion. “I don’t want you to get caught in the crossfire.”

That came out weird, mainly because it’s true. Aomine does indeed want Tetsu to be safe. And in light of recent events, ‘safe’ is as far away from Aomine as possible.

Strangely, Tetsu seems to have other plans. He gingerly takes Aomine’s hand in his, like you would when comforting a child, and looks him firmly in the eyes.

“I’ll protect you.”

Aomine glances at the umbrella, at Tetsu’s considerably smaller frame, at the little duck emblem on the poncho, and smiles.

“That’s a nice sentiment. But I don’t think you can help me with this.”

He means to walk away, but Tetsu’s grasp on his wrist tightens. Aomine stops, shooting Tetsu a puzzled look.

“Do you know how they will try to find you?” Tetsu says. “The same way I did. Your face will be out there, no matter how hard you try to hide. Every camera, every cell phone, they’ll follow you until they find you. But I can protect you. I can erase you from the system. I can make you walk _outside_ the system. All I ask in return is that you help me fix things.”

Aomine blinks in stunned silence.

“I’ll protect you,” Tetsu reiterates, this time with more force. He lets go of Aomine’s hand, then. He’s made his plea, and now it’s up to Aomine to decide what’s it gonna be - life on the run and possibly getting gunned down in some seedy back alley or... well, basically the same thing, only with a cleaner conscience.

Aomine figures doing some good along the way might earn him some karma points when the time comes. Plus, he can’t stand the thought that Tetsu might go and find somebody else, because obviously he’s just going to end up with someone half as good as Aomine and that simply won’t do.

“Okay, fine. I’ll finish this case with you,” Aomine agrees. “But promise me one thing: if I go missing, don’t come looking for me. Ever. Clear?”

Tetsu nods. “Clear.”

Aomine shakes his head in amusement and runs his hand through his wet hair, sending droplets flying everywhere like a dog. He grins when Tetsu tilts the umbrella forward like a shield.

“So, what about this hitman business you were talking about?” Aomine starts walking towards the street, with Tetsu falling into step next to him. He takes the umbrella when it’s offered and holds it over both of them, even though it won’t do much good now that Aomine is soaked through to the skin. But it’s still a nice gesture, and Aomine is beginning to like those.

Tetsu tugs at his coat underneath the poncho and makes a face. “How about we talk about this somewhere warm? And dry.”

Aomine laughs. “Good idea.”

“And perhaps we should get you some new clothes as well.” Tetsu throws him a sideways glance. “I don’t think standing in the rain constitutes as doing your laundry.”

Aomine smirks. “Sorry, forgot to bring my washing powder.”

It earns him an elbow to the side, but that’s okay, because Tetsu walks a little closer after that.

\---

Two hours later, Aomine is wearing a brand new suit, a new shirt, and shoes that are so shiny he can see his own reflection in the leather. He’ll have to get them dirty soon, because nothing draws attention like a man that’s too well dressed.

The suit fits well enough, but there are three others in the works that will be tailored, so he’ll be fine for the foreseeable future.

“How do you make people do that?” Aomine marvels, as he runs his hands along his new silk tie for the umpteenth time. They just returned from the tailor’s, who, for some reason, found it no problem at all to open his shop in the middle of the night for two strangers.

Tetsu is back at his computers, sorting through files. “I got him free pay TV once. He owed me.”

“And you decided to give up that favour for me?” Aomine stares, nonplussed. He can count on one hand the times people have willingly given up anything for him without being conned or tortured into it. So this is... new.

“You needed a new suit more than I do,” Tetsu states, and then gestures at the screen. “When I heard about Hanamiya’s plans, I set up a fake account to get him to send us more information on the target.”

“You playing hitman, Tetsu?” Aomine winks.

“Actually, I was just thinking _’What would Aomine-kun do’_ , and then went with that.”

“Oh God, you didn’t mention the Marrakesh job, did you?” Aomine nosily squeezes closer. “That was not my best work.”

Tetsu shoves him away. “I kept it vague, don’t worry.”

“Did he bite?”

“Yes.” Tetsu enlarges an image attachment. “He sent me this.”

Aomine leans forward and pouts, “Damn. She’s not even hot.”

He meant it as a joke, but Tetsu seems to mind a great deal, judging by his expression.

“I-... I mean, she’s okay. Totally okay. Not that I would-” He gives up. “Never mind.”

Tetsu graciously ignores his comments and moves on. “Her name is Aida Riko. She’s a freelance journalist. She works for several newspapers in the city, some sports magazines hire her on a regular basis, and she has a bimonthly column in _’Statistics Unlimited’_.”

“Wow,” Aomine rolls his eyes. “Sounds thrilling.”

“She’s doing okay for herself.” Tetsu scrolls through another document. “No outstanding debts - she took out a small loan to buy a car two years ago but she manages her repayments just fine. She has an apartment near East River Park.”

“Yeah, okay, this is all very fascinating, but why would Hanamiya want her dead?”

Tetsu’s gaze darts across the screens. “I don’t know. She used to live in the area until she was four, but other than that... wait a second...”

“What?” Aomine shuffles closer.

“Her uncle still lives there. He owns a small grocery store.”

Aomine rubs his chin in thought. “What do you reckon? Her uncle’s trying to sell something of hers to get out of payments to Hanamiya?”

Tetsu sends a blank stare his way. “Like I said, I don’t know.”

“You think I should find out.”

Tetsu nods.

“Then I should go and find out.” Aomine clears his throat and snatches his coat from the rings. “Let me guess, her address is already on my phone?”

Tetsu’s smiles are the tiniest things, but Aomine is starting to notice all the differences. This one is smug. Aomine’s pretty sure about that.


	9. Chapter 9

_”She just left the building,”_ Tetsu informs him, over their comm link. _”You’re good to go.”_

There are no cameras in the corridor, according to Tetsu, so the only thing Aomine has to worry about are nosy neighbours. He sneaks up to Aida’s door and flicks the lock open with practiced ease.

“I’m in,” he whispers, as he slides the lock-pick set back into his pocket and silently closes the door.

What greets him is basically the Hall of Fame of basketball.

“Uhm, wow.” Aomine strolls through the hallway like it’s a museum. In a way, it is - the walls are lined with posters of famous basketball players and their teams (some of them signed), memorabilia of all kinds (Aomine swears he saw a used sock under glass), and covers of sports magazines dating back to the early stages of basketball.

“This girl is _really_ into basketball,” Aomine muses, while inspecting a signed basketball in a showcase. What Aida lacks in hotness, she is definitely making up in taste in sports. Although the sock is a little bit creepy, even by Aomine’s standards.

 _”Anything pertaining to our case?”_ Tetsu asks, but it’s just _’Dude, get a move on’_ dressed up in fancy wording.

Aomine sighs loud enough for Tetsu to hear, and lets the beam of light from his phone’s flashlight sweep over her desk. “Okay, I see some cables, but no computer. Guess she must have a laptop.”

_”Yes, she had a bag with her when she left.”_

“Great,” Aomine groans. “That helps.”

He moves on to the file binders stacked on the desk and flips through them. There’s some interesting stuff in there about sports statistics that Aomine considers photographing to read later, but he decides against it. He doubts those are the reasons Hanamiya wants her dead.

_”Anything?”_

“Would you give me a second here?” Aomine grumbles as he starts digging through the cupboard next to the desk. “This chick is working on like fifty different things. I need a moment to get my bearings around here.”

The cupboard, at least, is a jackpot. It is stuffed to the brink with ring binders. They are labelled according to year, so Aomine picks the most recent one and dumps it on the desk.

“Alright.” He frowns. “I’ve got a lot of old police files here. What, is she trying to be a cop now too?”

_”Anything specific? Case numbers perhaps? A name?”_

“Yeah, yeah, I’m trying, but this stuff is all over the place.” Aomine flips back and forth between pages, trying to find some common ground. He pauses when he notices the documents are in chronological order, the last one dating back roughly twelve years.

“Hm. I think I’ve got something.” Aomine double-checks and nods. “Does the name Katsunori Harasawa ring any bells?”

_”Sure. He’s the current district attorney. Why?”_

Aomine comes across a couple of clear pockets containing photographs. He empties one on the desk, inspecting every image. They feature the same man in various situations over time, most of them with friends or family. What they all have in common, though, is the uniform.

“Hey, was he ever a cop, by any chance?”

For a moment, only Tetsu’s fervent typing fills his ear. He sounds stunned when he answers.

_”Indeed he was. He worked in the same precinct as detective Kagami.”_

“So, right in Hanamiya’s territory.”

_”Well, back then Hanamiya was probably still in high school, but yes, in theory, you are correct.”_

Aomine is gingerly putting the pictures back into the folder when his gaze falls upon a framed picture on Aida’s desk.

“Hey, is Aida’s father a cop too?”

The man in the picture is giving Aida a crushing hug, and she looks sufficiently annoyed for him to be a parent, or at least a close relative. He is wearing sergeant stripes.

_”As a matter of fact, he is-... was, I should say. He died last year in a car accident. He was Harasawa’s partner.”_

So it’s family ties. If it isn’t money or power or revenge, it’s fucking _family ties_ that make people do stupid things.

“Alright,” Aomine concludes, as he puts the frame and the file binders back where they belong. “I think I know what’s going on here.”

He flops down on Aida’s chair and props his feet up on her desk, rambling at Tetsu in the dark. “Okay, so, maybe Harasawa used to be on the take. And somehow this Aida chick gets wind of Harasawa’s unsavory activities through her pops. Maybe he was investigating as well, and now she feels like carrying on his legacy or some shit. Anyway, she finds something and maybe she babbles about it to her uncle or perhaps he snuck a peek at her notes. The man sells the information to Hanamiya in hopes of getting out of his payments. And Hanamiya is planning on using it as leverage to get into Akashi’s good graces. How’s that sound?”

 _”Thin,”_ Tetsu replies. _”But it will have to wait. She is coming back.”_

“What?” Aomine almost falls out of the chair. “I’m basically sitting here with my fucking pants down and you’re just telling me that _now_?”

_”I’m sorry. She took the back entrance. There are no cameras in the alley.”_

“Fuck.” Aomine hurriedly rolls the chair back into place.

_”She’s almost at the door, Aomine-kun.”_

“Yes, yes. For fuck’s sake, what do you expect me to do? Vanish? I’m not a fucking genie,” Aomine grumbles, while he frantically searches the apartment for a place to hide.

The footsteps outside come to a halt and Aomine can already hear the key sliding into the lock. He gives the closet in the kitchen another miserable look. If he squeezes, he might be able to fit next to the vacuum cleaner and the broom.

“Last time I had to hide in a closet I at least got laid,” Aomine curses, and tries to arrange himself around several household appliances. He pulls the door shut mere seconds before the lights flicker on.

On the plus side, this closet doesn’t hold clothes, so she won’t be needing it right away. And while she’s busy undressing, Aomine can sneak out.

He waits with bated breath until he can hear the telltale sounds of drawers and closet doors being repeatedly opened and closed in the other room before tentatively tiptoeing out of his hiding place.

Aida is in the bedroom, her laptop bag lying on the couch in the living room. Aomine briefly considers snatching it, but that would only give him away.

He glances around the corner to make sure she’s turned the other way and moves to sneak past her door. She is indeed oblivious to his presence - at least, until the window to Aomine’s right shatters and the wall next to her head sprouts a new hole.

They blink at each other for a moment before Aomine swears heartily and tackles Aida - shrieking and kicking, by the way - to the ground. And not a moment too soon, either, because a row of shots lands where she would have been.

“Who the hell are you?” she screams, hitting Aomine in the face with a shoe. The only saving grace is that it’s not a high heel.

“Would you stop that?” Aomine snarls, and wrestles the shoe from her hand while another bullet zings through the room. “I’m trying to save you here!”

“You broke into my apartment!” Aida yells and scrambles out from under him, quickly rearming herself with her bedside lamp.

Aomine sighs. “Okay, yes, I did. But I’m not the one shooting at you, so will you put the lamp down?”

She holds it like a baseball bat while huddled up in the corner between her bed and the closet. “No!”

“Lady,” Aomine says, holding his hands up in a placating gesture. “I promise I won’t hurt you, okay? I’m here because somebody is trying to kill you.” He points at the holes in the wall above her bed. “Exhibit A. Now, can we _please_ throw away the lamp and _duck_!”

He pulls Aida towards him, lamp and all, before the wooden floor splinters where she was sitting.

Ricochets are a nasty business. The bullet loses velocity and instead of a nice clean through-and-through, you get lead poisoning for the rest of the day. But it’s a neat way to make up for bad angles.

It also tells Aomine that the shooter is a pro.

In small blessings, Aida is not fighting him hand and foot anymore, but is instead staring at the hole in her floor in open terror. (Aomine uses this opportunity to get rid of the lamp.)

“Why is someone shooting at me?” Aida squeaks.

“Because of your research.” Aomine scoots over to the door and peers around the corner to gauge the shooter’s position. The roof of the building on the opposite side of the street would make for an impossible angle, even for the best of shots. The fire escape on the side, on the other hand, would make for an excellent perch.

“I do sports statistics!” she agonises, and Aomine notices she is no longer scared but angry. That’s not exactly better, though. Angry people have the same tendency not to listen to good advice as scared people.

Aomine motions for her to stay behind him. “Not that research. You were looking into district attorney Harasawa.”

“You did go through my things.” She is positively growling. Aomine is kind of glad he can’t see her right now.

“Well, yes.” He gestures vaguely and flings himself back against the wall a moment later, barely avoiding a bullet through his eyebrow. “But I swear I didn’t take anything, and I put it all back.”

“Why should I trust you?” She crosses her arms in front of her chest, and Aomine blinks at her in astonishment.

Aomine waves his hand at the window. “Because I’m not the one currently trying to kill you? If you need to trust someone, always go with the guy who’s _not shooting you_.”

“Could be a trap,” she shrugs, but flinches when yet another bullet buries itself a few feet from her toes. The line of holes is getting awfully close. The sniper is estimating their position in the room and gradually lining up his shots until he gets lucky. So they can either remain here like sitting ducks, or make a run for it and possibly get shot in the process.

Well, she’s not wrong about the trap situation.

Aomine shakes his head in irritation. “I don’t have time for this. Tetsu, you there?”

_”Yes. Are you alright, Aomine-kun?”_

“Yeah, yeah.” He throws Aida a glance over his shoulder. “We’re both fine. But we need a way out. Seems like Hanamiya didn’t want to take any chances and double-booked the job. There’s a sniper on the fire escape, on the other side of the street.”

_”Give me a second.”_

“Hurry up, Tetsu, I don’t know where her other shoe is.”

It should be worrying that Tetsu seems to know him well enough to not even ask.

Aida frowns and tries to get a look at his ear. “Who are you talking to?”

“A friend.” Aomine bats her hand away.

“Don’t you mean _accomplice_?” She quirks one eyebrow, and Aomine is sure fighting half a dozen armed gangsters couldn’t possibly be more strenuous.

“Both, okay? Both.”

 _”Get ready,”_ Tetsu butts in - perfect timing, since Aomine was actively considering knocking Aida out. ”I’ve tripped the fire alarm in the next building. That should scare him away. But I can’t do much else, I’m afraid. He’s picked a building with barely any infrastructure.”

“He’s clever.” Aomine grins, which seems to be the wrong reaction if Aida’s shocked expression is anything to go by.

“You are _nuts_ ,” she ascertains.

Aomine shrugs.“Just enough to survive. Listen - when I tell you to, you run to the door, okay? And you keep going until you get to the stairs. Don’t turn around, and for the love of God, do not wait for me. Understood?”

Aida nods, and then in almost the same movement, grasps Aomine’s arm. “My laptop. It’s-”

“Don’t worry. I’ll get it.” Aomine points at the hallway. “You just worry about running and not getting shot.”

She rolls her eyes in a way that Aomine really doesn’t approve of - mainly because it’s _his way of rolling his eyes_.

“Comforting.”

Aomine pointedly turns away. “Tetsu, how are we looking?”

_”People are leaving the building, but I can’t tell if your sniper is still there. He could be hiding among the tenants. The fire department is still thirty seconds away.”_

“Well,” Aomine says, sending a smirk Aida’s way. “We’ll just have to take a chance then, huh?”

“I am on the run with a madman.” Aida throws her hands up, but nods anyway. She scrambles around on the floor for her shoes, glaring at him as she puts them on.

The sound of the fire trucks arriving carries up to them, and Aomine figures it’s now or never.

He motions for Aida to get a move on. “Okay, go.”

“Why can’t we call the cops again?”

“ _Go!_ ”

“Alright, alright! I’m going!” She stumbles up and through the door, her shoes squeaking on the floor as she heads for the corridor outside.

Aomine makes sure she is well outside the apartment when he takes a deep breath and races towards the couch. Bullets follow him step by step.

“What the hell?” he screams at no one in particular, clutching the laptop bag to his chest. “What are you shooting at me for, you dumb shit!”

He crouches down and silently counts to five. Then he dashes forward into the hallway, the wall suffering from several lead-heavy explosions. He loses grip on the carpet for a moment but eventually makes it out into the corridor where, to his surprise, Aida is nowhere to be seen.

Good. At least she listens.

He hurries around the corner, following the neon _Exit_ signs until he reaches the stairwell. Aida almost bludgeons him in the face when he wrenches the door open.

“Ow!”

“Oh, damn.” She gingerly pats him on the shoulder. “I’m so sorry. I thought you were-”

“What?” Aomine snaps while rubbing his ear where the shoe scraped him. “Thought that I was _what_? How many other people were you expecting?”

Aida makes a miffed face, hands on her hips. “Maybe the guy’s got backup. I figured, better safe than sorry.”

Aomine snatches the shoe from her hand and waves it under her nose. “No more shoe hitting, you hear? Keep your shoes on your fucking feet, alright? Or I’ll let you run barefoot.”

He dumps it on the floor and shoves the laptop bag at her. “There. You’re welcome.”

“Who are you again?” Aida huffs, as she struggles to shoulder her laptop bag and keep up with Aomine. “Just so I know who to address my therapist’s bills to.”

“You can call me Daiki.”

“Fine, _Daiki_.” She stops at the bottom of the stairs to give him a stern look. “Who the _hell_ are you?”

“A concerned citizen,” Aomine grins, holding the door to the parking lot open for her.

She scoffs but stalks past him. “Which car?”

The parking lot doesn’t offer a lot of choices. He gestures at a nearby Ford - nicely dark and nondescript, and above all, easy to jack. “That one.”

He keeps an eye on the rooftops while they hurry over to the car.

Aida rattles at the passenger side door. “It’s locked.”

“No shit.” Aomine is already fiddling with the lock.

Aida’s eyes go wide, shortly before she starts flailing. “You-... You are stealing this car, aren’t you?”

The door clicks open, and Aomine reaches inside to unlock the other side. “Get in.”

“You want to tell me you didn’t even bring an escape vehicle?” Aida steadfastly refuses to plant her butt in the passenger seat. “What kind of a rescue is this?”

“A successful one,” Aomine says, shrugging, and gets behind the wheel. “You’re alive, aren’t you?”

She finally pulls the door open and scowls at him. “Yeah, to drive off in a stolen vehicle. I’m so relieved.”

Aomine’s smile is ice-cold. “Would you rather stay here?”

“I would rather wait for the damned police!” Aida complains, but she flops down in her seat after all. Apparently, the prospect of spending a prolonged amount of time potentially exposed to a sniper helps to move things forward.

The engine stutters to life, and Aomine regrets not having taken the Porsche next to it. But that wouldn’t exactly have been low key.

When Aomine glances over, Aida is pouting and stuffing the laptop bag like a shield between them.

“Hey, Tetsu, just out of curiosity... How much was Hanamiya gonna pay for this job?”

Aida’s shocked expression almost makes up for her being a pain in the ass.


	10. Chapter 10

He explains the situation to her along the way - where to, he’s not entirely sure yet, but something tells him Tetsu will have an answer soon enough.

Aomine keeps it purposely vague, which seems to leave the journalist in Aida helplessly frustrated. But she confirms most of Aomine’s theories.

“When I found my dad’s journal, I thought it was the least I could do.” Aida says, distinctly quieter now. “He’d had his suspicions, but Harasawa was a friend, and so he never investigated further.”

“And you thought sticking your nose into this would be a good idea?” Aomine snorts.

She folds her arms, giving him a steadfast look. “Yes. Yes, I did. And how is that any different from what you’re doing right now?”

“It’s my job.” At least... Aomine assumes it is. Either Tetsu is going to pay him at some point, or he's not going to be very happy about all the other ways Aomine will have to earn money.

“Well, this is mine.” Aida slumps back in her seat. Her lips are a thin, angry line, and Aomine may even be a little sorry.

“Look,” he adds, in hopes of assuaging her anger, “I didn’t mean to say you had no right, I’m just saying maybe you should have-”

“I should have what?”

Aomine isn’t listening. Something in the rear view mirror has caught his eye, and he can’t yet tell if it’s going to be amusing or annoying.

Aida wriggles around in her seat when she notices his stare. “What is it? Are they following us?”

Aomine narrows his eyes, trying to get a good look at the driver of the dark red Shelby that is sticking suspiciously close to their tail. Either the driver is not very experienced or they are not trying to hide in the first place.

It turns out to be the latter.

“Tetsu, we’ve got company,” Aomine sighs, but there’s a smile tugging at the corners of his lips. This is going to be fun.

_”Yes, I noticed. It’s-”_

“Detective Kagami,” Aomine finishes Tetsu’s sentence.

Aida gives him a worried look. “Are we gonna get arrested?”

Aomine checks the rear view mirror again and shakes his head ‘no’. “He could have done that a mile back. No, I think he wants to talk to me.”

“You two know each other?”

“A little.” Aomine smirks and makes sure to set the signal way ahead of the turn so that Kagami can easily follow. He can’t outrun Kagami in this piece of crap Ford Escort anyway. So, if dear detective Kagami wants to have a chat, he can have one - but on Aomine’s terms.

They keep it up until Aomine pulls into a deserted parking lot behind a closed-down supermarket. Aomine is surprised that Kagami was able to contain his temper long enough to follow them and didn’t just straight-up drive them off the street.

Although Kagami seems to be done with keeping it together. The Shelby wobbles on its wheels when Kagami slams the door shut and struts up to Aomine’s window.

“Nice car, detective.” Aomine waggles his eyebrows.

Kagami leans against the frame of the Ford, deceptively casual. “You know, I was just passing by a fake fire alarm and I was gonna head home but then I saw you. In what appears to be a stolen vehicle.”

Aomine glances around. “I was gonna return it.”

“Sure.” Kagami steps aside. “Get out.”

“Why?”

“Because I’m gonna ask you to explain _in detail_ what the fuck is going on and then I’m gonna punch you. And I don’t want to scare the young lady.”

“That’s not very tempting. Any other options?”

“Get the fuck out of that car or so help me I will shoot you in the leg.”

Aomine leans over to Aida, winking. “Excuse me for a second. I’m just gonna go have a talk with the police.”

“Are you sure you’re gonna be fine?” Aida peers at Kagami who is tapping his foot impatiently. “He looks like he’s going to make good on the punching thing.”

“Ah, don’t worry.” Aomine waves it off and climbs out of the car. “I can handle myself.”

He may have misspoken, though, because the next thing he knows he lands flat on his back on the hood of the Ford with Kagami looming over him, fists firmly tangled in the collar of Aomine’s coat.

“Easy there, detective,” Aomine grins, a tad dangerous now. “Somebody might get hurt.”

“I want to know exactly what you were doing back there,” Kagami hisses, his arm pressed up against Aomine’s windpipe. “How you ended up in a stolen vehicle and who the hell _she_ is.”

Aomine clears his throat, indicating that he might need some air to attempt any explanation at all, but Kagami won’t yield. Fine, two can play that game.

He hooks his leg around Kagami’s and pulls. Kagami lets go in order to maintain his balance and Aomine uses the opening to headbutt him. It’s not his most elegant move, but effective nonetheless.

Kagami staggers backwards, yelling profanities at Aomine, and rubbing his forehead.

“What the fuck you do that for?” Kagami screams.

Aomine smooths out the wrinkles in his suit, sending Kagami a derisive look. “I’m not lying on my back for people who don’t appreciate it.” He sits back on the hood of the Ford, smirking. “ _Now_ we can talk.”

“I should arrest you,” Kagami complains, stepping closer again. “Assaulting a police officer is a pretty serious offence.”

“Try me.” Aomine grins from ear to ear as he dangles the pair of handcuffs in front of Kagami’s face. Tucked into your belt isn’t really the best place to keep them. Aomine is still a damned good pickpocket – sort of a prerequisite for the job, actually.

“Oh, fuck you,” Kagami grumbles, snatching his handcuffs back. “Just talk already, will you?”

And Aomine does. Granted, he leaves out a few bits here and there - like the fact that Tetsu exists, for example - but all in all, he gives Kagami a rundown of recent events.

In hindsight, it’s not even so bad that Kagami is now tied into this. It will be convenient to have an actual cop on their side.

“But then we have to get her into protective custody,” Kagami says, with a nod towards Aida, who is not a big fan of the idea.

“Yeah, like that usually works out so well,” Aomine snorts. He has lost count of how many targets he’s executed while they were under police protection.

“Oh, and I suppose you think you can do better, huh?” Kagami huffs.

“Yep.” Aomine pulls out his phone and then proceeds to completely ignore Kagami. “Tetsu? Got a safe place where we can stay?”

 _”Yes. I’ve already sent the address to your phone.”_ Tetsu audibly hesitates. _”Is it really a good idea to bring Kagami-kun into this?”_

“It’s _Kagami-kun_ now?” Aomine scoffs. “You’re fast to assume he’s friendly.”

“Who are you-” Aomine catches _Kagami-kun_ flailing about in the corner of his eye, “who is he talking to?”

“His _little friend_ ,” Aida answers in Aomine’s stead, and he can practically hear the air quotes.

“What, he’s got a direct phone line to his dick?” Kagami grins. Aomine returns it, adding the bonus of flipping him the bird.

“Well, it was either that or run him over,” Aomine replies to Tetsu, enjoying the way Kagami’s facial expression turns from smug to sour.

_”I’m glad you picked the former, then.”_

“Nobody would have found the body.”

_”Sadly, I absolutely believe you. So, how would you like to proceed?”_

Aomine rubs his chin, slowly walking away from his two companions. “How much cash can you get me on short notice?”

Tetsu sounds startled. _”Are you planning on bribing Kagami-kun?”_

Aomine glances back at detective Kagami, who is somewhat of an epitome of _’to protect and serve’_. “Nah, I don’t think that would work. No, I need it for a few... purchases. And, as you know, I’m pretty much broke.”

_”I can get you up to ten thousand, but you would have to visit several ATMs.”_

“What, and I’m just gonna stand in front of them until they give me money? Tetsu, I’m not sure we have the same understanding of how ATMs work.”

_”Well, essentially, that is exactly how they work. All I'm doing is removing the necessity of a card and a code.”_

“Okay.” Aomine gives in. “Fine. Whatever. Just tell me where to go.”

_”The first one is just around the corner, to your right.”_

Aomine looks around, “How do you know which way I’m-... Tetsu, can you see me?”

 _”Yes.”_ Tetsu’s tone suggests he is astounded Aomine would ever assume otherwise.

“How-... There are no cameras around here.”

_”Kagami-kun’s car is equipped with a video camera. He seems to use it for police business too, so the department had one put in.”_

“Damn,” Aomine grimaces. “Such a nice car, and now it’s contaminated.”

 _”Aomine-kun...”_ Tetsu pauses, and Aomine notices how stressed he sounds. _”Please be careful.”_

Momoi used to say the same thing before every op. Aomine knows she was serious back then, and he knows Tetsu is being serious right now. And someday, he will learn to not ridicule people for it.

“Hey, I survived over a decade in the CIA. I’m gonna damn well survive this.”

_”Aomine-kun.”_

“Okay, yes, I’ll be careful.”

_”Thank you.”_

Tetsu seems genuinely thankful. Aomine doesn’t really know how to end this conversation, so he says the only thing he can think of to follow up on a _thank you_.

“Uhm... you’re welcome.”

He walks back to his car, bringing up Tetsu’s message containing the address. If Tetsu is laughing at him, he’s doing it really quietly.

“Okay, listen up,” Aomine announces, holding up his phone. “You bring Aida to this address. The door code is 1565.”

“Whoa! Hold on.” Kagami gestures wildly. “I’m not your fucking sidekick!”

Aomine shrugs. “You wanted to put her in protective custody. Well, you have custody now, so go protect her.”

“And where the hell do you think you’re going?” Kagami growls, when he sees Aomine fiddling with a map on his cell phone.

“I need to go get some stuff,” Aomine replies, absent-mindedly, as he heads off in the direction of the first ATM.

“Stuff?” Kagami echoes, tetchy like an overworked teacher.

Aomine turns around, grinning. “After all, I gotta kill her.”

“Okay,” Aida pipes up, tugging at Kagami’s pant leg since it’s the only thing she can reach from inside the car. “I am ready to go with you, officer.”

“Detective. I’m a detective.”

“Fine, _detective_. Let’s go.”

“Hey!” Kagami yells, “What about the car?”

Aomine waves over his shoulder, concentrating on the directions Tetsu has sent him. “Don’t worry. I’ll grab another one.”

“It’s a stolen vehicle! This city isn’t your own personal taxi stand, you insolent little shi-”

And that’s the last thing he hears before he rounds the corner.


	11. Chapter 11

Aomine rolls the stretcher into the apartment while Aida and Kagami stare at him in a mixture of horror and disbelief. He was relieved to find that the building has a back entrance and a separate service elevator. Fewer chances of getting spotted by other tenants, and a whole lot less struggle to get everything upstairs.

He pushes past them and neatly positions himself in the middle of the living room.

“Is that an actual dead person?” Aida cautiously takes a step away.

“I sure hope so,” Aomine says, as he opens the zipper on the body bag. “Otherwise, the morgue has made a terrible mistake.”

“Why are you bringing a corpse in here?” Kagami flails, while Aida looks like she is trying not to puke.

“The live ones are so hard to catch.”

Kagami leans closer, squinting. “Say, are you the devil?”

Aomine pretends to think about it while pulling down the body bag far enough to have access to the woman’s head. “I’m gonna have to get back to you on that.”

“Okay, I am done here,” Kagami says with a nod, and turns on his heel. He flops down on one of the exquisite-looking leather chairs and continues to glare at Aomine from there.

“Look.” Aomine reckons a little explanation won’t hurt. “Hanamiya isn’t going to pay up if he doesn’t get proof that Aida is dead. Whoever the second hitman was that he hired, that guy obviously won’t be able to prove it, so I will.”

“And how, exactly, is the dead lady here going to help with that?” Aida chimes in, still vaguely green in the face, but all in all, she is holding up rather well for a civilian.

“I’m gonna make her look like you.”

She narrows her eyes. “How many times have you done this before?”

Aomine silently counts down by his fingers.

“Oh my god, stop. I get it.” Aida averts her eyes and wildly motions for him to quit it.

“I’ve worked with worse base material.” Aomine grabs the plastic bag attached to the stretcher and empties the contents on the coffee table. “It’ll be good enough for a picture. Now sit down.”

He points at a chair nearby, then starts holding packets of hair dye up to Aida’s face. He couldn’t tell what color her hair was, so he bought a whole bunch. It doesn’t need to be an exact match since photographs fuck with the coloring, anyway, but the only girl of Aida’s build that they had at the morgue was blond, and Hanamiya is probably not color blind. Still, it’s very fascinating what two thousand bucks and a corrupt night clerk can buy you, these days.

Meanwhile, Aida keeps studying Aomine with eerie interest as he sets to work.

“You are a troubled individual,” she ascertains, all of a sudden.

Aomine looks up from the instructions on the hair dye, startled. “What?”

“Don’t get me wrong, I’m thankful for you rescuing me and all,” she says, holding up her hands, “but you have issues. Serious issues. Just saying.”

Aomine blinks in befuddlement.

Aida ducks her head and points at her ear. “I bet your little friend knows that too.”

Aomine drops the packet and rounds on Aida, pretending - for the sake of everybody’s health - not to notice how Kagami is going for his gun. “Okay, first of all, you don’t know shit. Neither about me nor about Tets-... my friend. And secondly, everybody stop fucking psychoanalyzing me.”

He deliberately ignores the fact that, in reality, _he_ doesn’t know jack squat about Tetsu either. But Tetsu speaks with _him_ and no one else, so that had better make him fucking special.

When neither of the two says anything, Aomine nods and returns his attention to the task at hand. “Good. And if any of you say another word, I’m gonna dye this chick’s hair with your blood.”

Aida pouts but keeps her mouth firmly shut and Kagami-

Well, he doesn’t _say_ anything, so Aomine can’t even fault him for it, but he makes his point either way.

He punches Aomine in the face.

(At least he’s a man of his word.)

\---

Kagami leans over the stretcher, inspecting Aomine’s work. “Where did you learn to do that?”

“I had to pose as a stylist once.” Aomine rubs his hands clean with a kitchen towel and tosses it into the trash bag he’s set up for all his equipment.

Both Kagami and Aida gape at him.

“What?” Aomine shrugs his shoulders. “It’s a useful skill.”

“Her nose is wrong,” Aida criticises, testily. She appears to have overcome her initial disgust and is now strangely focused on making this copy of her as exact as possible.

“Will you shut up?” Aomine huffs. “This is as close as it gets. It’ll do the trick, trust me.”

He rolls down the sleeves of his shirt and puts his suit jacket back on. Kagami leans against the wall, a bottle of Coke in his hand (Tetsu seems to keep this apartment well stocked), and watches him in silence. Aomine’s jaw still hurts from the punch earlier, but he’s surprised to find Kagami isn’t even gloating about it.

“So, what’s the plan now?” Kagami finally asks.

Aomine zips the body bag back up and dumps the trash bag on top, causing Aida to wince on behalf of the dead girl. They put some clothes on her that Aomine bought off a homeless lady for five bucks. It was a bit of a struggle, since Kagami was not at all happy to help. But they managed, and now Aida 2 is ready for duty.

“The plan is: I find a secluded spot to take the picture and then dump her where she won’t be f-”

Kagami puts his hand on the stretcher and firmly holds it back. “No. This girl, whoever she was, deserves a proper burial.”

“I’ll make sure to say a few words?” Aomine suggests, but Kagami isn’t joking about this.

“Return her to the morgue. I’ll fix up some paperwork for her in the morning.”

“Uhm.” Aomine gestures at the body. “Her hair is dyed. Post-mortem. She is wearing makeup and clothes, for fuck’s sake. What are you gonna do? Convince them she came back to life, got a make-over, and then decided to go back to the morgue? You know, zombies are weird but not that weird.”

Kagami leans into his personal space, scowling. “I’ll think of something. Just return her when you’re done.”

“Fine.” Aomine tugs at the stretcher. “Fine. Whatever. I’ll have to return the van, anyway.”

Kagami blinks. “You stole the coroner’s van?”

“I gave that cutthroat night clerk two thousand dollars. The van was included.”

Kagami runs his hand through his hair, obviously despairing. “I had hope in mankind. Until I met you.”

Aomine points vaguely. “You’re a cop. You have got to have seen worse.”

Kagami nods slowly. “I am currently recalibrating my perception of _’worse’_.”

“Good luck with that,” Aomine snorts, and pushes the stretcher towards the door. Kagami wouldn’t make a bad agent if it weren’t for his outstanding decency. He even insisted that they don’t look at the dead girl while dressing her up. Aomine has to wonder how Kagami can walk the streets as a cop every day and still maintain such a level of honesty and dignity.

“What do you want us to do?” Kagami inquires, before Aomine can leave.

“You two stay here for the rest of the night. We’re going to make Hanamiya hand-deliver the money so you can catch him in the act. I’ll give you a call when everything’s set up.”

Kagami shakes his head. “No, that won’t be enough to get him behind bars.”

Aomine smirks. “You’ll have plenty of evidence by morning. Account numbers, withdrawals, communication, the whole shebang.”

“Is this your friend’s doing?”

“Perhaps...”

Kagami is still not convinced, though. “And how am I going to explain this to my superiors? Let alone a _judge_?”

Aomine gives Kagami’s shoulder a friendly slap. “You worry too much. Like I said, you’ll have everything you need. All you have to do is arrest the bastard with the money in hand. His organisation will fall apart like a kid’s Lego tower once he’s gone.”

“Are you telling me your friend can fabricate an entire case?”

“I have no idea.” Aomine offers him a broad smile that may be teetering on the edge of madness and drags the stretcher onto the corridor. “But he said you would have all the stuff you need and I trust him.”

“So I should just do the same, or what? You are not exactly the best reference, you know.”

“If it’s any consolation to you, detective,” Aomine says, pointing at the body bag, “he didn’t approve of this plan either.”


	12. Chapter 12

"That's pretty unusual for you, though,“ Aomine observes, taking a hearty bite out of his hot dog. They're at Penn Station near the lockers and, for lack of a bagel delivery service, this is his breakfast.

Tetsu is eyeing him like he is watching an ant farm devour an enemy colony – with a mixture of terror and fascination. "What is?“ he asks, sipping his milkshake.

Aomine wipes a stray splotch of mustard from his chin and gestures at the general buzz of the train station. "That you would come out here with me to watch the show. I thought you'd be more comfortable behind your computers and stuff.“

Tetsu shrugs and returns his attention to the lockers. "I came out to offer you a job, didn't I?“

"Yeah,“ Aomine grins, "but that was special.“

Tetsu's answer is a long-drawn slurp from his shake, but Aomine can tell he's smiling.

"So.“ Aomine fiddles with the last remaining bits of his hot dog. "How _did_ you convince Hanamiya to show up in person?“

"Well, he's not here yet.“ Tetsu looks worried, his eyes darting from the entrance back to the long lines of lockers where they instructed Hanamiya to deposit the cash.

Detective Kagami is standing by with an undercover team. He keeps sending Aomine nasty glances, indicating he should remove his ass from the vicinity. But Aomine can be nice on occasion, so he replies with a broad smile and a little wave.

"What did you tell Hanamiya?“ Aomine says, around a mouthful of hot dog.

"I told him to show up alone, and if he didn't, I was going to kill him and then possibly set fire to everything he loves. Though I don't remember in which order.“

Aomine laughs, "You mean _I_ would.“

"I would strike the match.“

"Wow.“ Aomine eyes Tetsu with newfound respect. "That's pretty hardcore, coming from you.“

"Hanamiya is a bad person. I set up this operation to save people from bad guys like him because no one else would.“

"I bet Kagami would disagree.“

"Kagami-kun is a good cop,“ Tetsu admits. "But he's just one person. And he doesn't have my resources.“

Aomine frowns. "You mean the machine.“

He still hasn't quite wrapped his mind around the idea of an all-knowing machine that predicts crimes like moves on a chessboard, but from all he's seen, it is more likely to be true than not. Besides, this whole setup is way too elaborate to be a prank by some psycho.

Granted, Tetsu may be a little odd, but he's not a psycho. Aomine has seen a lot of them in his lifetime, and none of them were this cute.

"Yes.“ Tetsu eventually gives a slow nod. "That, and there's you.“

"Oh, so I'm a resource now.“ Aomine rolls his eyes. "Good to know.“

"What else would you like to be?“

Aomine stops munching on his last bite of hot dog and just stares at Tetsu, who seems oblivious to the ambiguity of his own question.

Tetsu is still a riddle, and Aomine is beginning to doubt that will ever change. Aomine used to be able to tell what level of flirtatiousness a conversation was at, but with Tetsu it's like swimming through a sea of _maybe_ 's. And what worries him most is that it frustrates him endlessly not to know for sure if he's imagining things.

“Uhm, I dunno,” Aomine says, carefully. “Just...”

He trails off, waving the empty hot dog wrapper around awkwardly, as if that explained it all.

Tetsu is looking at him, inquisitive. Aomine keeps his gaze steady on the lockers.

“Partners?” Tetsu eventually suggests, followed by an unusually loud, long slurp from the bottom of his milk shake, like a vanilla-flavoured question mark.

Aomine gives a nonchalant shrug and crumples up the wrapper to toss it into the trash can. He almost misses.

“Yeah, why not,” he replies, as if it's no big deal. “Haven't had a partner in a while.”

“I know.”

Aomine doesn't answer. He has a nasty tendency to lose his partners in record-breaking time – mostly on purpose. Getting attached to someone is the equivalent of putting a bullseye on your chest and screaming at the bad guys to shoot you in the heart. So Aomine decided to remove that threat from his life.

And now, apparently, he is letting it back in. The scariest part is that he's not even sorry.

“Look out,” Aomine says, nodding at the flow of people spilling in from the platforms. “Here he comes.”

Hanamiya is doing a pretty good job at blending in. He doesn't look anxious or hasty, just another traveller heading for the lockers.

“What do we do now?” Tetsu asks.

“Nothing.” Aomine shrugs. “Now we hope that Kagami is as good as you make him out to be. If everything goes well, they'll arrest Hanamiya and lock him up for a really long time. Problem solved. Nobody gets killed. That's what you wanted, isn't it?”

Tetsu doesn't look convinced, which is weird, because this is literally everything he wanted. Unless Aomine completely misinterpreted his agenda.

“I suppose so,” Tetsu says, eventually, while about a dozen undercover police officers jump out and yell at Hanamiya as soon as he opens the indicated locker door. The bag with the cash topples to the floor and a bunch of bystanders flee to safety. Aomine is disappointed about the lack of dollar bills spilling out from the bag, though. It would have made things a lot more impressive.

But Hanamiya simply gets manhandled onto the ground and handcuffed. Kagami has been put in charge of this operation, which should get him a nice commendation. He gives Aomine a small nod before reading Hanamiya his rights.

It's all done in a matter of minutes – not even enough time for a proper crowd to form. Of course, it does help that Hanamiya is carrying no less than two guns, which Aomine supposes will make for some convenient added charges. He doubts Hanamiya has permits for any of those.

“What's wrong?” Aomine asks, as they allow the police to slowly herd them towards the exit with the rest of the commuters.

Tetsu gives a highly uninformative shrug. “I don't know. I just-... there is always going to be another Hanamiya. The numbers will never stop coming.”

“True,” Aomine agrees. “Then we'll just have to take care of the next one, too.”

Tetsu stops, and it takes Aomine a moment to realise that he's walking beside thin air.

“So, you've decided to stay?” There he goes with the wide, impossibly blue eyes again, and Aomine doesn't know what to say.

In reality, Aomine suspects his mind had already been made up when he agreed to stay on for this case. He just likes to keep up appearances. And it seems Tetsu has been judging him correctly in this regard. It helps when Aomine doesn't have to speak his mind, because mostly his mind tells him to be a douchebag. And most people don't react too well to that.

Tetsu doesn't seem to be fazed by it, though.

“I, uh...” Aomine hesitates. Options, it's all about the options. “I thought, maybe for another case or two.”

Slowly, Tetsu's face lights up with a smile so bright Aomine thinks he might need shades if it goes on. It’s definitely the happiest Aomine has ever seen him.

“Ah, not forever,” Aomine sputters, in an attempt to keep his principles from crumbling. “Just, uh, you know... It's kind of hard to find a job when you have no past and you never asked for a resumé, so...”

“Stop rambling.” Tetsu bumps his elbow into Aomine's side as they continue walking. “You're free to leave anytime you want. I can't stop you.”

“Would you try?” It's not really a serious question, but Tetsu answers it nonetheless.

“Yes. But in the end, it's up to you. All I can do is ask you to stay.”

“Huh,” Aomine says, eloquently.

They exit the train station side by side, pausing at the corner. Aomine takes a deep breath and straightens up. “So, uh, am I going to get paid for any of this, or...”

Tetsu squints at him as if Aomine had just threatened to rob him in broad daylight, but the moment passes and Tetsu's expression eases into something like mild-mannered indulgence. He reaches into his pocket and produces a set of keys which he tosses at Aomine.

“The address is on the tag. If you go there, you will find some bank documents on the kitchen counter. Tell me if you need more.”

“What?” Aomine squawks, dumbfounded.

Tetsu points at the keys. “Technically, you don't have a place to stay. So, I thought...”

“You bought me an apartment?” Aomine will forever deny the slightly panicked tone in his voice. Never mind that Tetsu obviously opened a bank account in his name (well, in _someone’s_ name, anyway) but an apartment? This isn't attachment anymore, this is fucking _nailing himself to the floorboards_.

Tetsu blinks calmly at him. “I own the building.”

“You-... okay, no.” Aomine tries to force the keys back into Tetsu's hands but without much success. “No, no, no, I can't-... I'll find something of my own. No worries. Thanks, but-”

“Just take a look at it.” Tetsu firmly closes Aomine's fingers around the keys. “If you don't like it, just leave the keys with the doorman, no harm done. I just thought you might want a place of your own. The cot in the locker room was never meant for permanent use. Also, your feet stick out over the edge.”

“You planned this.” Aomine can't believe Tetsu was able to see through him like that – even more so, considering that even Aomine can't predict what Aomine is going to do next. “You knew I was going to stay.”

Tetsu looks up at him, and Aomine swears there is a wicked glint in his eyes. “I was hoping you would.”

“You-” Aomine says, waving the keys under Tetsu's nose in an accusatory manner, “-you sneaky motherfucker.”

He considers giving the keys back for another second or two, but then pockets them and grins. Tetsu counters with a smile of his own and starts heading towards the intersection. He turns around when Aomine isn't following.

“Where are you going?” Tetsu asks.

“I've got something to take care of.” Aomine makes a vague gesture in the other direction. “I'll go to the apartment afterwards. Promise.”

Tetsu's smile fades. “Old CIA business again?”

Aomine winks. “Nope. Don't worry, this is strictly CIA-free business.”

“I'll see you at the gym then, yes?”

“Sure thing.” Aomine waves and makes a show of disappearing mysteriously into the crowd.


	13. Chapter 13

He _borrows_ another car not far from the train station, and heads over to the pet shop.

He figures Tetsu wouldn't approve of this. Tetsu doesn't want their targets – well, _clients_ , really – to know that they are being helped, and Aomine understands that. After all, he comes from a world where anonymity is as crucial as air.

But this is the first time that Aomine can actually go back to a place and tell its people that they are safe now. Or rather, he can hint at it.

The thing is, he's never been able to do that, and he wants to know what it feels like. Plus, he still owes these guys a purchase.

“Oh, look who it is,” Hyūga says, glancing up from behind the counter when Aomine enters. “The man with the curiously multi-colored dog.”

“Fine,” Aomine smiles, holding up his hands. “You caught me. I don't have a dog.”

“Fluorescent cat, perhaps?”

“If you ever get one of those, let me know.” Aomine leans against the counter which makes Hyūga frown. “How's your better half?”

“He's neither better nor worse than I am,” Hyūga huffs, but deflates quickly. “And he's fine considering the circumstances. At least, I managed to get him to stay upstairs.”

“Good.” Aomine nods and realises he doesn't really know how what to say, so for a few very awkward minutes they just occasionally stare at each other.

Until Hyūga throws his pen down and sighs. “Okay, what are you here for?”

This makes things much easier. Aomine presents Hyūga with a brilliant smile. “I'm here to let you know that your neighborhood may have just become a lot safer than it used to be.”

Hyūga arches one eyebrow. “And you know this how?”

Aomine plucks some hairs (they're everywhere in this store) from his sleeve, not looking at Hyūga. “Let's just say I have a very reliable source.”

Hyūga snorts. “Okay then. Thanks for letting me know, whoever you might be. Have a good day.”

“Really? That's it?”

“What did you expect?”

Aomine blinks, momentarily stunned. He wasn't sure what to expect but it sure as hell wasn't this. It should feel a lot more... gratifying, in Aomine's opinion.

“I-... You know what?” Aomine leans closer. “Forget what I said. Let's talk dogs. What have you got on offer right now?”

Hyūga looks downright appalled. “I'm not sure I trust you with a dog.”

Aomine inclines his head, thinking, “Well, technically, it's not for me. It’s for a friend. I'm thinking something cute. And fluffy. And possibly not potty-trained.”

“ _Not potty-trained_?” Hyūga echoes.

“Yeah. My friend needs to get out more, you know.”

Hyūga narrows his eyes in open suspicion. “Who _are you_?”

Aomine smirks. “A concerned dog lover.”

\---

The little ball of fur traipses after him, tongue hanging out the side of its mouth, its tiny legs a blur in its attempt to keep up. It doesn't have a name yet, but Aomine is inclined to just call it 'Tetsu II', because those are some stunningly blue eyes and Aomine only knows one other being that he can say the same about.

Tetsu II squats down next to his feet, panting and yapping at the same time, which makes it sound like Aomine stepped on a squeaky toy.

“Okay, okay, give me a minute, will you?” Aomine fiddles with the lock until the driver's side door clicks open. He gets in and stretches to unlock the back door so that Tetsu II can hop in.

“There you go.”

Tetsu II doesn't go anywhere. Instead he (Hyūga hammered it into his head that it's a 'he' after he got fed up with Aomine calling the dog an 'it') jumps up and starts barking at a volume Aomine didn't think possible for such a small creature.

“Will you shut up already?” Aomine wriggles out of his seat. “What do you want? I-... I don't know what you-... I don't speak dog, okay? Either write it down or get in the fucking car.”

Tetsu II refuses to spontaneously develop writing skills, and merely continues to back away from the car.

Aomine heaves a sigh and stumbles after his new pet. When he finally gets the struggling, barking ball of fluff back in his arms, he tosses Tetsu II head first onto the backseat. “Sit.”

He almost hits his head when he fights to keep the dog in the car. He has never encountered a being so opposed to taking a car ride.

A moment later he finds out why. Two strong arms wrap around his upper body and neck in a way that indicates the attacker knows exactly how to immobilize a target.

Aomine's instincts kick in a second too late. Something stings the back of his neck, and in the few moments before everything goes dark, he catches a blurry glimpse of a frighteningly serene smile framed by glasses and jet-black hair.

He is vaguely aware of getting shoved onto the backseat, but his limbs are unresponsive, and the last thing he notices is Tetsu II stepping on his face, followed by some frantic licking which Aomine is going to be deeply disgusted about once he wakes up.

\---

This is fascinating, because it has been a while since Aomine woke up tied to a chair in an abandoned structure. Usually, it’s him who’s doing the tying up.

Sadly, this also means he knows what's coming.

He groans when the world around him spins like a carousel out of control and squeezes his eyes shut. Somewhere to his right Tetsu II is barking, but it sounds far off.

Aomine yanks at the bindings, but without much hope. Even the damn chair is welded to the floor.

“What the hell did you give me?” Aomine grumbles when the view finally becomes a little clearer and he's not feeling seasick anymore.

“Your skills are rusty,” someone replies. “Although I guess it’s hard to recognize when you’ve always been on the other end of the needle.”

Aomine squints into rectangular shapes of blinding white light that he can only assume are large windows. Light still hurts his eyes, so he lowers his head again, laughing. He knows who his captor is, anyway.

“Imayoshi,” Aomine smiles, humorlessly. “Can’t say I’m glad to see you.”

“Yes,” Imayoshi sighs - he’s closer now, Aomine can tell by the rustling of his clothes. “I get that a lot.”

Imayoshi Shoichi, the Agency’s hunting dog. Whenever the CIA has a problem with one of their own they call Imayoshi. He finds everyone. He’s a creepy bastard (and Aomine uses the word ‘creepy’ in a distinctly less favourable way than he does with Tetsu) but he could probably find Narnia even without the fucking closet.

If the Agency sent Imayoshi, they must have been really desperate. Aomine is pretty damned proud of himself.

“Ever wonder why?” Aomine snorts, and receives a low chuckle in return. A chair gets dragged over the cold floor. The ground is bare, nothing but uneven concrete - that much Aomine can feel through his socks. Imayoshi took away his shoes. He also removed Aomine’s coat and suit jacket, the tie is dangling loosely from Aomine’s neck. His belt and anything that could possibly conceal a bug or GPS tracker are gone.

“I’m just doing my job,” Imayoshi says. “Same as you.”

Aomine finally looks up, his grin sharp as a knife. Imayoshi’s face is still a bit blurry and it’s hard to focus on any details, but he knows a smug bastard when he sees one.

“Don’t know if you heard, but I got fired.”

“Really?” Imayoshi stands in front of him, offering a glass of water. “That’s strange. I heard nothing of the sort.”

Aomine allows Imayoshi to set the glass against his lips and takes a few generous gulps. Those drugs make you damned thirsty, and it can hardly get worse than it already is. If Imayoshi wanted to kill him, he wouldn’t do it with a glass of water.

“Yeah.” Aomine rubs his chin against his shoulder to dry off what escaped his lips. “You probably heard that I died.”

Imayoshi looks offended when he sits down not two feet from Aomine. He puts the glass down on a table nearby. Aomine’s cell phone is laid out as well - in parts. The Glock right next to the laptop does not escape Aomine’s attention, and neither does the set of triggers. There must be explosive charges hidden throughout the building. Who the hell is Imayoshi expecting? The freaking National Guard?

“How did you find me?” Aomine asks, after a minute of irritating silence. It was probably that idiot Kise who led them to him, but maybe they’re not on to what he’s been doing just yet.

Imayoshi laughs. It would be mysterious if it wasn’t so fucking annoying. “Oh, but we never lost you.”

Aomine narrows his eyes. “What?”

Imayoshi leans in, shaking his head as if he’s pitying Aomine. Asshole.

“This was never about you.”

Aomine racks his brain for what Imayoshi means that could possibly be of interest to the-

He looks up with a start, eyes wide in speechless horror. The late September chill suddenly feels like he’s back in Russia, cold and bleeding in the snow.

Imayoshi isn’t after him. He’s after _Tetsu_.

“ _No..._ ” It’s the only thing that comes out of his mouth when he finally pieces it together.

“I can see you’ve worked out why you’re here.” Imayoshi smiles like the bespectacled snake that he is.

“No,” Aomine repeats, as if it’s the only thing his vocal cords allow for. He doesn’t know what to think. He wants to bash his head against the wall, but at the same time he also wants to curl in on himself and wish for this to be a mere nightmare. He also really, desperately, wants to punch Imayoshi in the face.

At this point, he doesn’t even give a fuck anymore that his shock is written plainly across his face. Acting becomes infinitely harder when your heart is aiming to crawl up your throat.

He starts yanking at the plastic bands tying him to the chair, tugging so ferociously that they cut into his skin. But he doesn’t care. He needs to get out of here, get to Tetsu, warn him somehow, _anything_ to rectify this immense mess that he’s created.

“Why?” Aomine manages eventually. “What do you want from him?”

Imayoshi slowly starts putting Aomine’s cell phone back together. “Oh, so our little friend didn’t tell you, huh?”

“Tell me what?” Aomine huffs. He is beginning to get tired of Imayoshi’s games. He wants to know what the fuck is going on and how he can make it right. Imayoshi’s cryptic answers aren’t helping.

Imayoshi leans back, toying with the cell phone in his hands. “Let me tell you a story.”

“Oh god.” Aomine rolls his eyes.

“Don’t worry, you’ll like this one.” Imayoshi grins. “Roughly ten years ago, the Agency hired an extremely talented programmer to develop a program that would enable us to stop any terrorist threat before it could even become one. It took him years, but eventually he delivered. And it was some truly magnificent coding - at least, from what we could tell by the outcome of our first missions based on the machine’s information.”

“There was only one problem,” Imayoshi continues, casually attaching a cable to the cell phone, probably running an algorithm on his laptop to unlock it. “The programmer went missing shortly after his work was done. He disappeared, went completely off the grid.”

“So what?” Aomine interrupts. “You’ve got your fucking God machine. What do you need him for?”

Imayoshi’s laugh is grating on Aomine’s nerves. The urge to stuff it back down his throat is starting to hurt more than the plastic that’s grinding into his flesh.

“Well, you see, that programmer had a few objections as to how the machine was being used.” Imayoshi disconnects the cable and tosses it aside. “He locked it down. Nobody can get in. The code is hidden behind so many layers of encryption and traps that even our best hackers can’t get to it. Which, I think you can imagine, made a lot of people very angry.”

Aomine sneers. “They don’t like black boxes, huh?”

“Nobody likes black boxes, Aomine.” Imayoshi makes a disgusted face. The cell phone beeps, and Aomine can only hope that Tetsu will ignore the sudden blip on his radar when the GPS comes back on.

“So, you need Tets-” Aomine clears his throat, but his slip-up has been noted, judging by Imayoshi’s smirk, “-you need that guy to unlock it for you. Well, tough luck. I don’t know where he is.”

“You don’t need to.” Imayoshi is lazily clicking through the menu. “You see, about a year ago we noticed someone poking through our personnel files. Nothing was stolen, or even copied, according to our logs. But it seemed like somebody was looking for something very specific.”

Aomine does not like where this is going.

“We never caught whoever it was who was hacking into our servers, which led to the theory that it might be our programmer friend. He was searching for an agent. And so...” Imayoshi pauses, glancing at Aomine with a wicked smile, “we gave him one.”

Aomine swears his heart stops right there. He goes stock-still, muscles taut in mid-movement. The hits just keep on coming and Aomine can’t remember how to turn his cheek.

“Russia...” Aomine whispers, and Imayoshi nods.

“We needed you on the run with no obvious ties to the CIA. We needed _you_ to believe it. Otherwise Kuroko would have never picked you up.”

Aomine starts at the mention of Tetsu’s name. So it _is_ his real name. Aomine isn’t sure how to feel about that. Nobody should trust him this much.

Least of all Tetsu, it seems.

Aomine has had so many chances to walk away. It’s what he _does_. But this time, for the _first time_ , he didn’t. He stayed, and he led them straight to Tetsu.

This is exactly why alone is better. That way the only one who can get hurt is him, and he probably deserves it, too.

He swallows hard, looking up to scowl at Imayoshi. “And Satsuki? What about her? What did she have to do with anything?”

Imayoshi blinks as if he doesn’t even know what Aomine is talking about, and that sweeps the grief aside to make room for blinding anger. Imayoshi is not _allowed_ to not know who Momoi Satsuki was.

“Don’t fucking act like you have no idea who I’m talking about!” Aomine screams, fighting his bonds to get his hands on Imayoshi’s traitor throat. “Satsuki had nothing to do with this! You had no reason to kill her.”

“Oh, you mean your handler.” Imayoshi perks up and then shrugs. “She got wind of our plans and tried to warn you. We couldn’t have that.”

“You fucking asshole!” Aomine is yelling at the top of his lungs until his voice cracks. The chair creaks as it strains against Aomine’s attempts to bite Imayoshi’s nose off.

“If it’s any consolation to you,” Imayoshi says calmly, “I didn’t kill her.”

“Tell me who did it and I’ll make sure you can watch each other die,” Aomine snarls.

“Tempting, but no.” Imayoshi smiles as if Aomine had presented him with an actual choice. “Look on the bright side: when this is over, you’ll still have a job.”

“Ha!” Aomine throws his head back when he laughs - in retrospect, not a good idea, since it makes his head spin. “You really think after all this shit the Agency pulled, I’m just gonna crawl back into their lap? I don’t think so.”

“That’s unfortunate,” Imayoshi says, and even sounds disappointed. He stands up and walks over to the small table. Aomine tenses, because nothing that’s on there can make this end well.

“I was hoping we could do this the easy way.” Imayoshi gives him a slightly sorrowful look, which Aomine answers with a proud grin.

“When have I ever done anything the easy way?”

“True.”

And then the gun is in Imayoshi’s hand faster than Aomine can think. The shot rings twice as loud in Aomine’s ears, but it’s still not as bad as the pain that suddenly explodes in his right arm.

Aomine cries out, trying to clutch his arm but, naturally, doesn’t get very far. Instead he doubles over, wheezing and forcing his breathing back under control.

“You fucking son of a bitch!” Aomine wails, craning his neck to get a look at the wound. He can’t see much through the rapidly expanding red stain on his sleeve but a bit of the backrest is missing so it has to be a through and through.

Meanwhile, Imayoshi calmly puts his gun back on the table. He looks at Aomine and this time the smile is gone. There is nothing but cold calculation in its stead.

“I need you alive for this next part. Not necessarily _well_.”

“Fuck you!” Aomine spits on the ground. His saliva is tinted red. He must have bitten down on his tongue.

“Why so uncooperative?” Imayoshi says with a sigh. He crouches down next to Aomine, winding a long piece of cloth around Aomine’s arm. “We’re not planning on killing your darling friend. We just need him to decrypt the code, and then you two can wander off to wherever you like.”

Aomine winces when the pressure increases on his wound. “I doubt that’s all you want.”

The Agency doesn’t do things half-assed. And they certainly don’t let people like Tetsu walk free with such dangerous knowledge.

Imayoshi looks up from his handiwork as if it’s Aomine’s fault for not seeing his point. “We are not the bad guys here.”

Aomine makes a show of rattling his bonds. “Sure. That’s why you don’t drug people, tie them to chairs, and then _fucking shoot them_.”

“You’ve done worse.” Imayoshi forcefully pulls at the cloth and Aomine can barely keep the pained gasp from escaping his lips. “This is actually an opportunity to make up for some of that.”

Aomine grimaces when Imayoshi pats his arm none too gently. “No, I don’t think so.”

Imayoshi shakes his head and gets up. He looks disappointed, and Aomine is torn on whether to buy the act or not. Aomine has been in the same place far too often to trust what people show on the outside.

“Look,” Aomine tries to reason with him. “I don’t know what you expect from me. I already told you, I don’t know where he is and he sure as hell isn’t going to come find me.”

He promised. Tetsu _promised_. Aomine may have a rather casual approach towards these kinds of things, but Tetsu seems like the kind of guy who takes promises very seriously. At least, Aomine has to hope that he does.

“That’s odd, because he has been coming to your aid quite often so far,” Imayoshi grins.

“How do you even know?” Aomine trails off, gaping at Imayoshi for a second. “You-... The roof-... The sniper on the roof at Aida’s place. That was _you_.”

Imayoshi’s smile grows, almost fond. _Atta boy, Aomine. Atta boy._

“I meant to separate you from the girl,” Imayoshi shrugs, picking up the phone again. “But Kuroko proved to be smarter than I thought. And _faster_.”

Aomine can’t deny that his chest swells a little with pride.

“At least, it confirmed that you were indeed working with him,” Imayoshi adds, and, admittedly, it puts a few dents in Aomine’s tin hat of triumph.

“So, what now?” Aomine holds his head up high, regardless of recent revelations. He is not going to give Imayoshi any more cannon fodder. “You expect me to push a secret button somewhere and make Tetsu magically pop up out of nowhere?”

(Granted, Tetsu does have a tendency to turn up out of the blue.)

“ _Tetsu_ , huh?” Imayoshi leers. “That’s awfully affectionate. Something you wanna tell me?”

Aomine squirms uncomfortably. He hadn’t meant to say that. But he plays it cool. At least his CIA training is good for _something_.

“I could be calling him ‘darling chitterbug’ for all you care,” Aomine smirks. “It won’t change the fact that you won’t get to him.”

“Well,” Imayoshi says, peering at the screen and nods to himself. “We’ll see about that.”

He twirls Aomine’s phone in his hands, the screen lit with Tetsu’s number. “I can’t get his location, but _you_ can bring him to me.”

Aomine laughs, dry and maniacal. “And you think I’m just gonna go along with this? Haven’t you been listening?”

Imayoshi slowly moves to stand right behind Aomine. That’s a pretty well-known technique - it’s mighty unnerving not to be able to see what your opponent is doing - but that doesn’t mean it’s not working.

“You would be doing both of you a favor,” Imayoshi implores - as if the bastard actually means it.

Aomine snorts. “The only one I’d be doing a favor is the Agency, and I’m kinda done with that.”

“Maybe you shouldn’t be so quick to dismiss my offer.” Imayoshi leans heavily onto Aomine’s shoulder, intentionally putting additional strain onto the injured arm. “After all, what do you have without your job?”

Aomine clenches his teeth, forcing himself to stay quiet but he can feel the scream clawing its way up his throat. Classic - physical pain coupled with emotional stress; and Aomine knows Imayoshi is right. He started working for the CIA because it was a challenge. Thankfully, when that ceased to be an option, Tetsu provided new and interesting opportunities to keep him occupied, but if that is gone too... what is left?

However, it’s not all over yet. There is always some fight left in him.

“Fuck you.” Aomine looks up at Imayoshi, expression distorted in a grimace locked somewhere between defiance and pain. “We both know you can torture me all you want, I won’t make that call.”

In this regard, Aomine is at least not suffering from delusions of grandeur. If there is one thing you learn at the CIA, it is to withstand more forms of torture than one human being can come up with.

Imayoshi hums knowingly. “So, I suppose that’s your final answer, huh?”

Aomine presses his lips together in silent contempt.

“Shame,” Imayoshi sighs, and smacks Aomine’s arm hard enough to make him cry out. “I was hoping we could come to an easy understanding. But I see you’ve become quite a loyal dog.”

“Partners,” Aomine pants, yet maintaining his smirk. “We’re partners. That loyal dog bullshit is so last year.”

Imayoshi blinks at him for a moment, and then laughs. “I see. Well then, why don’t we put this to the test?”

He returns to the table and snatches up his gun again, looking down at it as if trying to figure out what to do next. Aomine merely grins. _’Bring it.’_.

The safety clicks ominously loud in the vast concrete hall when Imayoshi aims at him. At this distance Aomine reckons the resulting hole in his head is going to take up half his face. But he’s strangely okay with that. He’s never counted on being a particularly pretty corpse.

For once he’s not fighting for some mysterious agenda, he’s not under orders - no, this time he knows what he’s fighting for and he’s absolutely, 100% sure that it’s the best idea he’s ever had.

“Go ahead,” Aomine snarls. “Shoot me. You’ll never find him.”

“We’ll see.” Imayoshi smiles and pulls the trigger.


	14. Chapter 14

The good thing about having a bullet whiz past your ear at close range is that it is only a near-deaf experience and you’re still around to complain about it.

The drawback is that the beeping sound that remains can drive you nuts. Still better than being dead - or so Aomine thought.

“Ow! Motherfucker!” He shakes his head, working his jaw in a vain attempt to get the ringing to stop.

He squints up at Imayoshi who seems to be talking to someone on Aomine’s phone, giving instructions.

“The next shot isn’t going to miss,” Imayoshi says, a pleased smile on his face like he’s just solved today’s crossword puzzle. “One hour. Don’t be late.”

And then, all of a sudden, damaged hearing is the least of Aomine’s problems. He gapes at Imayoshi and the phone that he’d dismissed as inactive. A big mistake, considering that literally _everything_ in Imayoshi’s hands eventually serves a purpose.

Aomine curses himself in his head for being so easy to fool and strains against his bonds, yelling at the top of his lungs so Tetsu might hear him on the other end of the line.

“No! Tetsu! You hear me? Don’t come! Whatever he says, don’t come! You promised!” He hears himself as if through a cotton wall but that does nothing to diminish the way his voice cracks. He can’t even bring himself to care. He’s fucked up again and now all he can do is scream at his own failures.

Imayoshi motions for him to shut up but he just keeps going until the handle of the gun hits him hard across the jaw.

“I’m sorry,” Imayoshi says, and it’s not quite clear what he’s apologizing for - hitting Aomine or rendering him useless. “I knew you wouldn’t make that call. So, I thought I would put my faith in the other half of your duo.”

“He won’t come,” Aomine mutters, slumping back against the chair.

“Why?” Imayoshi tosses Aomine’s phone back onto the table. “Because of a promise? That is unusually romantic of you.”

Aomine doesn’t reply. He is not going to engage in a discussion with Imayoshi on how he _needs_ to believe that Tetsu will honor their deal. Tetsu will find someone else. They will probably not be as good as Aomine, but at least Tetsu _will be out there_ , doing his magical coding thing and kicking the CIA’s ass.

That’s what he chooses to believe, and it makes grinning into Imayoshi’s face a lot easier. “Oh, you’d be surprised.”

Imayoshi observes him for a long time with an expression that’s difficult to read - could be respect, could be pity. Either way, Aomine doesn’t like it.

Sadly, he doesn’t get to have a say, because Imayoshi unpacks a syringe from a sleek metal case and plants it firmly in Aomine’s neck.

“I thought we were over this,” Aomine mocks, but he can already feel his tongue go numb so it comes out sounding like he’s had a drink too many.

“Sorry.” Imayoshi crouches down in front of him, smiling amiably. “But I can’t have you interfering when our friend arrives. And we both know you’re desperate enough to try.”

Aomine smirks, but it’s kind of lopsided. Damn, this stuff works fast. He can barely keep his eyes open, and his head suddenly weighs a ton. Well, at least Imayoshi isn’t taking him lightly.

Far off to his right, Tetsu II has taken up his barking tirade again, and Aomine drifts off to sleep, thinking, _Good boy._.


	15. Chapter 15

Aomine has had more relaxing naps. Waking up via slap in the face, however, is a theme he is strikingly familiar with.

It’s a very gentle slap, though. Maybe that’s why it doesn’t quite do the trick. The first tangible thing that actually transpires is the sound of an explosion.

That, too, is something he has come to live with.

“Aomine-kun! Can you hear me?”

That’s a strangely concerned tone of voice for someone who just smacked him in the face, but alright, Aomine decides to give it a try. He blinks his eyes open, but it’s a little hard to turn his head. Everything seems to go too slow and too fast at the same time.

“Tet-... Tetsu?” He asks the splotch of color before him.

“Aomine-kun,” Tetsu sounds relieved - a notion Aomine can’t really second. “How are you feeling?”

Aomine’s eyesight slowly begins to clear and he finds himself looking straight into Tetsu’s impossibly big eyes. As his senses start to resume their regular duties, he also notices that his hands appear to be free.

He awkwardly pokes Tetsu in the chest. “You promised!”

Tetsu rolls his eyes, and at this distance it is somewhat dizzying to watch. “Did you really think I was going to give up on you?”

Aomine winces when Tetsu tries to get him up from the chair. In the distance something goes _boom_ , but it barely registers in the face of agony caused by a shot-up arm.

He glares at Tetsu and takes new aim for a hefty shove. “Doesn’t matter. You promised.”

The fact that Tetsu is standing right in front of him, apparently unharmed and very much a free man, makes his anger seem a little directionless, though.

Tetsu heaves a sigh and temporarily ceases his efforts of getting Aomine to move. “I never promised. I said I _understood_ , that is all.”

Aomine shakes his head, immediately regretting it when his vision blurs again. “Don’t split hairs! That’s the same thing.”

Tetsu clearly means to answer, but a somewhat bored-sounding voice interrupts from Aomine’s right-hand side. “We should get going.”

As if on cue, another explosion shakes the building - this time a lot closer.

Aomine whips his head around, staring directly at somebody’s crotch. After some adjustment in the upward direction, he realises he is looking at a freakishly tall guy with curiously purple hair. He’s seen this one before.

He grabs Tetsu by the collar, hissing, “You asked _Akashi fuckin’ Seijuro_ for help?”

Tetsu tries to untangle himself, but even when drugged, Aomine has a pretty tight grip. Eventually, he gives up and merely looks vaguely guilty. “Let’s just say I didn’t need a phone call to know you were in trouble. Now, can we please go? I promise I’ll explain later.”

Aomine makes a face that indicates what he thinks of further promises, but allows Tetsu to shoulder some of his weight as he stands up. He can’t trust his legs yet, but in a few minutes he should be able to walk on his own.

The human bean pole shuffles along, exhibiting zero interest in helping.

Aomine nods his head at their new friend. “And who is he?”

Tetsu groans a little under Aomine’s weight. “His name is Murasakibara Atsushi. Akashi told him to accompany me in case I needed help getting you out.”

Aomine eyes the world’s most inefficient rescue dog. “Well, he’s doing a bang-up job right now.”

Murasakibara looks as if he might wander off at any moment to find a quiet corner to go to sleep in. He doesn’t even flinch when the walls shake from the sixth explosion since Aomine regained consciousness.

Speaking of dogs, though...

“Hey, wait.” Aomine forces them to a halt. “I-... there was a dog. Tiny thing. Surprisingly sturdy. I think Imayoshi locked him away somewhere. We need to-”

“Don’t worry,” Tetsu smiles. “We found him on our way up here. He’s waiting outside.”

“Oh.” Aomine feels a little dumb for making such a fuss over it. “Uh... good.”

Tetsu adjusts his grip as they wobble down the stairs and briefly looks up at him, eyes twinkling with mirth. “I didn’t know you had a dog.”

“I didn’t.” Aomine winces when they bump into the wall but tries to cover it with a grin. “Bought him for you. To keep you company when I’m out.”

Tetsu looks like a fish out of water for a second, but then his lips ease into a gentle smile. He gives a wordless nod and drags Aomine out the door, while somewhere behind them, the staircase collapses with a deafening boom.

The view outside that presents itself to them is that of a very well-dressed army making ready to conquer a medium-sized town. Several expensive-looking limousines are parked along the road, and men in suits that cost almost as much are hurrying back and forth between the curb and the building entrances. Most of them aren’t even trying to conceal their weapons. Aomine guesses they have no reason to - the neighbourhood seems mostly occupied by large warehouses or industrial facilities. This is quite likely the furthest one can be from any police station in this city.

“Wow.” Aomine stares at the amassed cavalry. “Not the National Guard, but close enough.”

Tetsu smiles, but there is a sadness to it that Aomine can’t quite understand. Maybe his jokes aren’t as funny as he likes to think.

Tetsu II pummels into Aomine’s legs, barking excitedly as they make their way towards a familiar figure who is waiting patiently by one of the cars. Even if Aomine hadn’t known him, he would have been able to pick him out as the man in charge. Akashi Seijuro holds himself like a general, and even Aomine feels the need to straighten up a bit.

“I was curious,” Akashi announces, when they come to stand in front of him. “I wanted to see what kind of man Kuroko would give up a life for.”

“Give up a life-” Aomine frowns, looking to Tetsu. “What? Tetsu, what is he talking about?”

But Tetsu refuses to meet his eyes. “I-... It was the only thing I could think of.”

“Tetsu?” Aomine shakes off Tetsu’s arm and turns to him. “Tetsu, what did you _do_?”

Something horrible, judging by the way Tetsu is avoiding eye contact like it’s going to give him cancer. Every alarm bell in Aomine’s head goes off at once, because if Tetsu is good at one thing, it is staring you down.

“Tetsu, what-” Aomine tries again, but gets interrupted by a bunch of Akashi’s men hauling Imayoshi out onto the street.

“Ah.” Akashi nods. “I understand this is the one that was giving you trouble?”

Aomine scowls while Imayoshi - wrapped up like a postal package - merely presents him with the serene smile of a person who is not new to this treatment and knows exactly how to get out of it.

“Watch his hands,” Aomine snarls, and carefully inches a little further in front of Tetsu. Imayoshi is mean, ruthless, and crafty in the times between, so Aomine isn’t taking any chances.

Akashi never takes his eyes off of Aomine while he motions for his henchmen to take Imayoshi away. They stuff him into the back of one of the interchangeable limousines, one prize boxer-sized gangster on each side - as if physical force could stop Imayoshi.

Aomine watches with considerable unease. Sure, Kuroko basically brought an army, but Aomine has slipped out of goddamned _war zones_ undetected, so he’s wary of Imayoshi’s apparent inability to do the same.

“Just out of curiosity.” Aomine squints at Akashi. “What are you going to do with him?”

Akashi stares at him, probably considering whether Aomine is even worth talking to. Eventually, he gives a miniscule shrug. “There are crimes the police would like to hold me responsible for. I disagree.”

Aomine sputters, “So, you’re planning on pinning them on _him_?”

“Unless you have a better idea?” Akashi half-turns to leave but then stops, smiling in a way that makes Aomine want to put more distance between them. “I was given to understand that a non-lethal solution to your problem would be appreciated.”

Hells yes, Aomine has a better idea. Imayoshi might not be responsible for Satsuki’s death in person, but if anyone can lead Aomine to her killer, it’s him. And if anything should happen to Imayoshi in the process... well, Aomine won’t shed a tear.

Aomine balls his good hand into a fist by his side, trying to contain himself. “You know what? No. I don’t appreciate it at all. This bastard knows who killed my handler, and I am damned well going to get it out of him. You are _not_ taking that away.”

Akashi takes his dear time to answer. For a while, Aomine is almost convinced he managed to accidentally stop time out of sheer anger. But then Akashi shifts, and normality is restored by way of Akashi smiling like a switchblade on two legs.

“I’m afraid it’s not up to you. This was part of our bargain, and if you would like me to honor the rest of our agreement as well, I suggest you leave it to me and refrain from making any such demands. I will make sure to let you know should he say anything relevant to your case.”

Aomine means to object but Tetsu steps in, putting his hand soothingly on Aomine’s arm. He finally looks Aomine in the eyes.

“It’s true. I am not proud of it, but it was my choice. And I chose to save you.”

Aomine blinks in stunned silence for a moment. He isn’t sure he appreciates the irony in getting saved only to be rendered helpless. Also, who the fuck said he needed saving?

“So you’re telling me I’m alive and well but I can’t kick his ass?”

Tetsu nods, somewhat mournfully. Akashi merely grants him a couple of seconds to come to terms with this development before turning away.

Aomine’s shoulders sag when he realises there is no arguing against Akashi (or Tetsu, for that matter) unless he wants to fight his way through Akashi’s underlings - something even Aomine gives a limited chance of success, in his current state.

It still doesn’t sit right with him, though. Not the fact that Akashi is taking care of all their problems - Aomine is sure _that_ is going to bite them in the ass soon enough - but rather Imayoshi’s lack of a plan B. Spies are trained to work with the bare necessities, and a backup plan in case you get caught is about as bare as it can get.

Unless, of course, compliance is part of plan B.

“Wait.” Aomine frowns, stopping both Tetsu and Akashi in their tracks. “How many explosions?”

Tetsu only has a look of confusion to offer.

“How many explosions did you count?” Aomine’s mind is racing. He counted six, but he can’t tell how many he missed while he was out.

“I don’t know.” Tetsu gives a helpless shrug. “Six or seven?”

Aomine closes his eyes, trying to remember what he saw on the table. Imayoshi’s gun, his cell phone-

“Eight triggers,” Aomine breathes. “Seven explosions.”

His heart starts pounding like a drum when he realises they are standing in front of the car he stole to get to the pet shop, God knows how many hours earlier. Now, _there’s_ a plan B.

Aomine doesn’t even think. He lets instinct and years of training take over. After all, this is what he is best at. Don’t think - _do_. He grabs Tetsu and simply barrels into Akashi, throwing all three of them on the ground. And not a moment too soon.

The car erupts in a ball of fire, lifting it off the ground like a magic trick. The doors bulge against the force of the explosion, three of them getting unhinged altogether. The driver’s side door soars over their heads in a hailstorm of sharp debris and broken glass. Pieces of smoldering metal bury themselves in the grass around them.

It takes a good while before anyone dares to move again.

Next to him Tetsu struggles onto hands and knees, coughing. On Aomine’s other side, Akashi is probably already planning his murder. Both seem to be alright, though, so Aomine allows himself to breathe a sigh of relief.

Or he would, if breathing wasn’t so fucking hard right now.

The funny thing is that his arm doesn’t even hurt so bad anymore, which is weird because it was pretty excruciating not two minutes ago. But perhaps it just pales compared to the angry, fiery knot of hell-sent pain that is beginning to settle in his side.

“Aomine-kun.” Tetsu’s voice is barely audible over the ringing in Aomine’s ears, but his expression confirms Aomine’s suspicions that things are not going according to plan. He scrambles over to Aomine, his hands a welcome yet faint sensation on Aomine’s arms.

Aomine makes it onto all fours with Tetsu’s help, but he immediately flops down on his ass like a woozy dog. He vaguely notices Tetsu catching him.

That is the second time somebody meant to blow him up. This shit is getting tedious.

“Hm,” Aomine comments, in his usual eloquent fashion, when he gets a look at the mess. A piece of metal is poking out from a hole in his shirt, and the speed at which the surrounding areas are turning red with blood is alarming.

“Don’t move,” Tetsu implores, and for once, Aomine agrees. Moving hurts like a motherfucker. Hell, even _breathing_ hurts like all three heads of Cerberus are taking a chunk out of his side at once.

He is getting drowsy. It shouldn’t happen so fast, but who knows what effects the drugs he’s been given are having. It takes him a lot more effort to keep his eyes open than he wants to admit.

Meanwhile, Akashi has made it back onto his feet and is looking down at them as if he’s studying a painting. Then he waves for the big guy.

“Bring them to Midorima,” Akashi orders. “Tell him I sent them.”

Aomine wheezes, exposing his teeth in a smile tainted with blood, and looks up at Tetsu. “Please tell me Midorima is a doctor.”

Judging by Tetsu’s expression, he is still not funny.


	16. Chapter 16

When you wake up in a strange place with little to no recollection of how you got there, it is usually a good idea to start the day with an assessment of what you _do_ know. It helps keep the panic at bay and it passes the time until the opportunity to gather more information presents itself.

So Aomine rubs his eyes until the room doesn’t look like it’s underwater anymore, and ticks off his internal checklist.

Most notably, his hands and feet are free, although moving about is still out of the question. Every time he tries to sit up, some invisible torture master rams a spear into his side.

Aomine carefully lifts the blanket and inspects the source of his pain. Thick gauze covers most of his left side, but he can’t see any blood leaking through, which is probably a good sign. His arm and both of his wrists are heavily bandaged, too. It looks pretty professional.

Which brings him to his next point: _Where the hell am I?_

The room has one window, reasonably large, but taped over with milky-white foil like some painters had forgotten to take it down. Two heaters, one in each corner, keep it comfortably warm. The rest of the room gives the impression of a work in progress, though.

Only one wall is painted in pristine white; the others are still plain concrete, as is the floor. A foldable chair is leaning in the corner, but apart from that, the bed he’s lying in is the only furniture.

If you don’t count the medical equipment, that is. Aomine turns his head to observe the blinking screens. Either whoever is taking care of him raided a hospital or this is the shittiest hospital room he’s ever been in. And he once had a bullet removed in a _boatshed_.

The monitors look a little battered, but for what it’s worth, they seem to be doing their job.

Aomine gives the IV in his arm a suspicious tap. His head feels like a balloon, but other than that he’s doing okay, so whatever it is that is slowly dripping through the tubes isn’t making him worse.

He strains his hearing for sounds from outside. He can’t hear any traffic, so he figures he is either very far from any bigger streets or it’s extremely early in the morning. What he can hear, though, is _barking_.

Aomine would recognise that high-pitched yelping anywhere by now.

The barking grows louder, and now there are footsteps too, but they sound different from Tetsu’s ninja-style walk. Aomine frantically searches for any weapons, but short of hitting his visitor over the head with the folding chair, there isn’t much he would be strong enough to use.

His worry is needless, though. The door opens and Tetsu II bolts into the room, only marginally obstructed by the young man’s legs.

“Oh, you’re awake.” A delighted smile crosses the man’s face. He is wearing scrubs, but Aomine can’t see a name tag or any other form of identification.

“Who-” Aomine frowns. His voice sounds like he tried to gargle with sandpaper. He clears his throat and tries again. “Where am I?”

The young man laughs while trying to herd Tetsu II out of the room. He closes the door and turns to Aomine with a broad grin. “You’re at a hospital. Of sorts.”

“Very funny.” Aomine scowls as he watches the stranger expertly examine the printouts from the monitors. “This isn’t a hospital and you sure as hell aren’t a doctor. So, let’s try this again, okay?”

He receives a knowing smile in return. “Wrong. This was indeed supposed to be a hospital. They ran out of funds halfway, though, so it’s been empty for years.”

(That explains the comfy construction site-feel of this place.)

“And you are?” Aomine squints at the young guy. His hair is held up with a thin hair-band but it’s not doing a very good job of keeping it out of his face.

“My name is Takao, but you can call me Kazunari if you like.” He adjusts the IV and sends another smile Aomine’s way. It seems genuine. Aomine can even see the little laughter lines.

“And you were right,” Takao continues, chuckling. “I’m not a doctor. I’m the nurse.”

Aomine eyes him, meaning to make a joke about how Takao is about three bra sizes too small to fill the hot nurse trope, but all things considered, he is quite attractive. Despite that, Aomine makes a miffed face. “Where’s your sexy colleague? The one with the cleavage and the never-ending legs.”

Takao laughs, shaking his head. “The only one with long legs around here is Shin-chan and he probably wouldn’t appreciate your attitude.”

“Shin-chan?” Aomine raises his eyebrows.

“Oh! Sorry. I’m not supposed to call him that in front of patients. Whoops. Don’t tell him.” Takao smiles sheepishly. “His name is Midorima. He operated on you.”

That name, at least, rings a bell.

“So, this-” Aomine vaguely waves his free arm, “-Midorima guy is the doctor around here?”

“Yep.” Takao nods enthusiastically as he starts tucking the blanket back in around Aomine. At that rate, he is going to mummify Aomine.

Aomine purposely kicks his feet free as best as he can once Takao is done, which earns him a scolding glance. “So, what is this place?”

Takao cocks his head to the side, thinking. “We provide medical treatment for those who can’t go to a hospital.”

“An underground clinic?”

Takao shrugs. “We’re on the fifth floor so I don’t know how ‘underground’ we really are, but... yes, that’s essentially what we are.”

Aomine wonders how many other patients there are besides him. He has seen underground hospitals, but most of them were in somebody’s backyard, and you were lucky if the resident surgeon didn’t drink any of the alcohol before disinfecting his instruments. By comparison, this operation here seems well-funded. And Takao is by far the most hygienic, nicest, and most professional nurse Aomine has ever encountered in a place like this.

“Oh!” Takao pipes up when Aomine remains silent. “I almost forgot. You have a visitor.”

Aomine swallows hard. He doesn’t want to admit it, but he was worried when Tetsu wasn’t the first person he saw when he woke up. He really can’t remember much from the drive over here, but what stands out is Tetsu’s face - blurry as it was at that point. Aomine thinks he recalls tears, but that could be the dejected spy in him talking. _Wanting_ someone to cry over you doesn’t necessarily make it reality.

“He sat in here the whole time,” Takao goes on, as if he’s recounting fond vacation memories. “Wouldn’t let go of your hand until Shin-... I mean _doctor Midorima_ threatened to poison you if he didn’t leave.”

Slowly, tentatively, Aomine begins to smile. The image of Tetsu falling asleep by his side is better than medicine.

“He’s been waiting outside ever since.” Takao gestures at the door. “You want me to go get him?”

“Yeah,” Aomine snorts. “We kind of have a lot to talk about.”

Takao comes to his aid when he struggles into a sitting position, fluffing up his pillow before he leaves, which is possibly a universal compulsion for nurses everywhere.

He leaves the door open, revealing a long, barren corridor lit with a couple of light bulbs dangling from the ceiling. Aomine spots the edge of a couch or a futon around the corner.

There are hushed words and more barking, followed by a furry assault. Tetsu II is up in Aomine’s lap in an instant. Aomine can’t even react as fast as that tiny tongue is all over his face. He tries to shove Tetsu II off of him, but it’s not until the original steps in that the poofy ball of excitement is removed from his bed.

Tetsu gently puts his furry namesake down on the ground where the commotion seems to die down a bit. When he looks back up, his face is a whole kaleidoscope of emotions. There’s relief and joy; worry, too, and if that’s not guilt Aomine is seeing, then he doesn’t know what is.

“Hi,” Tetsu says, after a long moment of simply staring at Aomine in meaningful silence.

“You,” Aomine says, pointing an accusatory finger at Tetsu, albeit jokingly, “have a hell of a lot to explain, partner.”

Tetsu lets out a heavy sigh, nodding. He shuffles to sit on the bed, and it fascinates Aomine that it doesn’t even occur to Tetsu to grab the folding chair.

Tetsu II whines, prompting Tetsu to pick him up. The small animal curls up in Tetsu’s lap, blinking happily at Aomine.

“I named him Nigou,” Tetsu explains, while scratching the dog behind the ears. “I hope you don’t mind?”

“I hadn’t really thought of a name yet,” Aomine lies. He isn’t going to let Tetsu in on the fact that his first reaction was to name the dog after him. “You’re deflecting, by the way,” he chastises.

Tetsu’s gaze drops. “I’m sorry.”

“About what?”

“This is all my fault.”

Aomine laughs. “None of this is your fault, Tetsu.”

“No, you don’t understand.” Tetsu shifts as much as he can so that they are face to face. “All of this happened because I did something I shouldn’t have.”

“You mean like coming to save me when you promised that you wouldn’t?” Aomine winks, but the teasing backfires when Tetsu merely looks at him, unflinchingly.

“No, that’s not what I meant. And I am not sorry for it.”

“Oh.” Aomine isn’t sure what to say to that. “Uhm. Okay, well, I guess I can’t complain either.”

It’s always easy to scold someone when you’re alive. It’s terribly hard to do it from the grave, although Aomine bets he is going to make a pretty swell poltergeist one day.

“I don’t know how much Imayoshi told you,” Tetsu says, “but I reckon you know by now that I programmed the machine.”

Aomine nods. “And they wanted to find you so that you could unlock the code for them. Yeah, I know. I still don’t understand why you think that makes it your fault?”

Tetsu takes a deep breath and even Nigou is lying stock-still in his lap. This is the big one, the grand exposé. Aomine braces himself for some awful truths.

“I built a failsafe around my code because I suspected something like this might happen. I locked myself out too.”

“What about the numbers?” Aomine interjects. “Couldn’t you just trace them back or something?”

Tetsu smiles but it’s weak and a little pitying. “The numbers are an outlet, not a way in. Originally, they weren’t supposed to be sent anywhere, but when I noticed how many there were, I wanted to know. I kept looking up numbers and when I realised that none of these people were going to be alright, I programmed a way for the machine to communicate them to me. But that’s it. It can’t be traced because once it’s sent, it’s destroyed at the source.” He pauses as if he expects Aomine to say something, but when Aomine remains silent, he goes on. “I stopped looking at the numbers altogether for a long time afterwards. I was too afraid to come too late all the time. I felt helpless. But then the machine started giving me one number, over and over again. So I looked into it. It was an alias.”

Aomine has a feeling this is where his recent encounter with the Agency comes in, but he keeps his mouth shut. This is the longest Tetsu has ever talked about his past and Aomine is not going to ruin it with Captain Obvious comments.

“The machine kept sending me more numbers after that. All different names, different lives.” Tetsu smiles. “But not different people.”

“You managed to run into an agent,” Aomine smirks.

“Not just any agent. _You._ ”

Aomine’s eyes go wide. “You were looking for _me_ in those personnel files?”

“I was tracking you by your missions.” Tetsu’s smile turns a little cheeky. “You have a way of killing your aliases.”

Aomine grins impishly. “I like to be thorough.”

“And you were,” Tetsu agrees. “It took me two years to finally catch up with you. The day we met the machine had given me three numbers. I believe you broke one nose and shot one of them.”

The mini gangsters from the subway. Aomine had almost forgotten about those. “So, you’re telling me your machine played matchmaker?”

Tetsu shoots him a skeptical look. “It’s a machine, Aomine-kun. It doesn’t understand love.”

“Doesn’t mean it was wrong.”

Tetsu starts, and Aomine realises what he just blurted out.

“I-... I mean-” Aomine tries to salvage the situation. “I-... I don’t even know if you-... you know?”

He drops the debris of this conversation and leaves it to Tetsu. Aomine squirms uncomfortably under Tetsu’s unreadable gaze.

Then Tetsu leans over and kisses him. It’s soft, but there is no hesitation in it. If Aomine wasn’t in such a sorry state, he would pull Tetsu on top of him and never stop. In fact, he tries, but Tetsu gently removes Aomine’s hand from his shirt.

He kisses Aomine’s open palm and smiles. “The machine is never wrong.”

Aomine’s grin is so wide at this point that his cheeks hurt, but he can’t stop. He hugs Tetsu with one arm, ignoring the pang of pain, ignoring Nigou who hops off Tetsu’s lap and back onto the ground with a disgruntled yap, ignoring _everything_. In this moment, he realises how fiercely he must have already loved Tetsu. But sometimes it’s hard to see past the layers of ingrained suspicion and fake emotions. It’s like digging for gems - you have to go through a whole lot of worthless bullshit to get to the real thing.

And this is his. This _must_ be it, because for the first time, Aomine isn’t trying to think up excuses to leave.

It scares him, too. But in a good way. He has finally found himself a new challenge.

Tetsu wriggles onto the bed, resting his head lightly on Aomine’s shoulder where it won’t hurt and for a while they just lie there like this. Aomine breathes in Tetsu’s scent - a mixture of tea (possibly sponsored by Takao; he seems like the kind of nurse who would bring worrying partners tea to calm their nerves) and those few moments before it starts to rain. And, fine, a little bit of dog, too, but hey, they probably slept curled up together on that couch, so Aomine can’t bring himself to mind.

He wishes he could hold Tetsu forever like this, but there is still one more question to ask. Aomine doesn’t want to start a relationship based on unasked questions. He has done that often enough.

“You know, you’re not off the hook, though,” Aomine says, softly. “You still haven’t told me what exactly your agreement was with Akashi.”

For a second, Tetsu doesn’t stir, but then he slowly slips away, returning to sit by Aomine’s side. It’s actually not all that warm with Tetsu gone, Aomine notices.

“When I saw that your cell phone was offline, I got worried.” Tetsu’s voice is so low Aomine has to strain his ears to even hear him. Nigou’s head occasionally pops up from below the bed as he plays with Tetsu’s foot. Tetsu seems awfully captivated by it. “I activated the tracker in your keys.”

“The keys,” Aomine deadpans. “You mean the ones to the apartment you _gave to me_.”

Tetsu shrugs his shoulders. “Sorry. It was supposed to be more of a gimmick in case you lost them than a rescue measure.”

Aomine throws his head back, laughing. “Say, is there any part of me where you _haven’t_ planted a tracker?”

“There aren’t any on you right now,” Tetsu says, and this time Aomine isn’t imagining the suggestive tone. He is wearing nothing but a hospital gown, after all.

“Good to know,” Aomine grins.

“Anyway.” Tetsu sighs as he resumes his story. “I already knew where you were when the call came. I had called Akashi about an hour before, asking for a personal meeting.”

“Why did you call Akashi, of all people?” Aomine laments. “Why not... I don’t know, Kagami, for example?”

Tetsu picks at the lapels of his sweater, refusing to look at Aomine. “That was the problem. See, when your phone was off, Kagami-kun sent you a text-”

“You read my texts?”

“Well.” Tetsu glances at him. “Technically, it _is_ my phone.”

Aomine snickers. “Neat. That way I’ll just text myself if I want to sext you.”

Tetsu sends him a disapproving glare, but Aomine has no doubt that he will have Tetsu accustomed to the wonders of sexting soon enough.

“Okay,” Aomine amends, “what did Kagami want?”

“He said Hanamiya was turning state’s evidence against Akashi.”

Aomine snorts. “That little shit. I knew he wasn’t going to-... wait a second.” He stares at Tetsu in sheer disbelief. “Hold on. You didn’t... did you?”

Hanamiya may be a small fish, but that doesn’t mean he wasn’t clever enough to gather intel while he was sucking up to Akashi. If Hanamiya decided to testify, it could ruin Akashi’s organisation - a risk, Aomine is pretty sure, Akashi would not be willing to take.

“I offered Akashi information on Hanamiya’s whereabouts in exchange for his help,” Tetsu confirms, low and with his back turned, as if he can’t stand to say it to Aomine’s face.

Aomine, on the other hand, can’t look away. He knows Tetsu isn’t so naive as to believe Akashi will just have a ‘stern talk’ with Hanamiya. The man has a reputation of nipping threats in the bud in a permanent manner. But that Tetsu would be willing to go so far is something that might require a bit of processing.

“Tetsu...” Aomine isn’t sure what else to say. He’s been there; he’s had to make that decision countless times. _’Sorry you had to have a man killed for me’_ doesn’t quite cut it.

“So, Imayoshi wasn’t the life Akashi was talking about, huh?” Aomine murmurs after a while.

Tetsu finally turns to look at him, shaking his head. “I told him he could do with Imayoshi whatever he wanted. I didn’t care.”

Aomine fishes for Tetsu’s hand and finds it twisted in the blanket. He slides his fingers between Tetsu’s, offering a smile. It may have been a bit lopsided, though.

“That’s pretty cold.”

“Cold is not what I felt.”

Aomine blinks, part in shock and, part in growing awe.

“Look,” Tetsu says, when Aomine does nothing but stare at him. “I’m sorry you didn’t get a chance to ask Imayoshi about your handler.”

He waves it off. “Ah, forget it. He would have given me a bunch of lies anyway. He does that. I’m gonna find another way.”

“And I’ll help.” Tetsu nods determinedly, squeezing Aomine’s hand as emphasis.

A quest for a quest. Aomine can work with that. Only he has a feeling Tetsu’s doesn’t exactly have an end point.

“So,” Aomine announces, tugging Tetsu closer, “what now, partner? You’ve had to make some pretty tough decisions and chances are it’s only going to get worse. You ready for that?”

Tetsu hangs his head a little.

“It might not be up to me,” he explains when Aomine merely frowns in confusion. “Akashi wants us gone. He wants us out of the city. Out of the _country_ , if possible.”

Aomine rolls his eyes, sighing. “Why doesn’t that surprise me.”

“You saved his life. He promised to honor that.” Considering what Akashi normally does when he wants people gone, Tetsu is not acting as relieved as he should be. “By letting us leave. Unhindered and unharmed.”

In Aomine’s line of work - or, well, his _previous_ line of work - there is always unfinished business. Faking your own death only gets you so far. But sometimes that unfinished business is on your end, and that’s when things get complicated. Especially when said business consists of an endless stream of numbers that equal actual dead bodies if you don’t keep up.

He gently nudges Tetsu’s chin. “So... you wanna leave?”

It takes barely a second for Tetsu to answer, “No.”

“You do know that if we stay we’ll have to go up against Akashi,” Aomine reminds him. Even thinking about it is a phenomenally bad idea. But then again, Aomine’s entire _life_ has been a string of bad ideas, and at least now he’s doing it for the right reasons. And he’s not doing it alone.

“Yes, I know.” Tetsu nods.

There are about a billion things that can, and _will_ , go wrong. A billion reasons to run.

But what’s a billion compared to the one that’s right before him? Nothing, that’s what.

Aomine snuggles back into the pillow, tugging Tetsu along with him. “Well, I was beginning to really enjoy New York anyway. Besides, I have an apartment here. Would be a shame to give that up.”

He doesn’t need to see Tetsu’s face to know that he is smiling.

\---

Detective Kagami throws the bag of burgers on the passenger seat and scrambles behind the wheel of his car, one cheeseburger precariously balanced between his teeth. He fiddles with the ignition and starts the engine.

“Didn’t they teach you to always check the backseat?”

Half of the cheeseburger lands in Kagami’s lap, the other half decorates the steering wheel in a trail of slimy cheese.

“Holy shit! What the fuck-” Kagami squints at the rear view mirror, groaning when he realises who it is. “Oh no, not you again.”

Aomine grins.


End file.
